Release Date: 23/05/13
Publisher: Bantam Press
SYNOPSIS:
The next moment he was upon him, his eyes blazing, his mouth open to reveal his fangs.
Osokin began to pray, not that he would live but that he would truly die . . .
Turkmenistan 1881: the fortress city of Geok Tepe has fallen to the Russians.
Beneath its citadel sits a prisoner. He hasn't moved from his chair for two years. Neither has he felt the sun on his face for more than fifty . . . although for that he is grateful.
Into this subterranean gaol marches a Russian officer. He has come for the captive. Not to release him, but to return him to St Petersburg - to deliver him into the hands of an old, old enemy who would visit damnation upon the ruling family of Russia: the great vampire Zmyeevich . . .
But there is another who has escaped Geok Tepe and followed the prisoner. He is not concerned with the fate of the tsar, or Zmyeevich or the officer. All he desires is revenge.
And other forces have a part to play. A group of revolutionaries has vowed to bring the dictatorship of Tsar Aleksandr to an end, and with it the entire Romanov dynasty. They call themselves The People's Will . . .
REVIEW:
To be blunt whilst I enjoyed the first couple I’m really starting to find that the books are losing me as they’re spent with more explanations rather than concentrating on plot and keeping me glued as a reader. The writing whilst OK didn’t keep my attention, the characters felt more 2d rather than rounded and overall I felt that in places the plot lacked quite a bit of pace.
Don’t get me wrong, I did love the setting and whilst I’m not that familiar with the historical context, I love the uncertainty of knowing the survivability as well as how each of the plot aspects will play out. On this front its alright overall but on the whole I felt a little upset with the way that it feels like the series is spinning out of control.
Release Date: 18/08/11
SYNOPSIS:
Russia 1855. After forty years of peace in Europe, war rages. In the Crimea, the city of Sevastopol is besieged. In the north, Saint Petersburg is blockaded. But in Moscow there is one who needs only to sit and wait – wait for the death of an aging tsar, and for the curse upon his blood to be passed to a new generation.
As their country grows weaker, a man and a woman - unaware of the hidden ties that bind them - must come to terms with their shared legacy. In Moscow, Tamara Valentinovna Komarova uncovers a brutal murder and discovers that it not the first in a sequence of similar crimes, merely the latest, carried out by a killer who has stalked the city since 1812.
And in Sevastopol, Dmitry Alekseevich Danilov faces not only the guns of the combined armies of Britain and France, but must also make a stand against creatures that his father had thought buried beneath the earth, thirty years before..
REVIEW:
To be honest I’ve been reading Jasper’s work since he burst on the scene with his debut, Twelve which I loved with the blend of historical fiction and the vampire myth. It worked wonderfully well and announced a new name with a thrilling concept for fans of the undead as well as the historical fiction hero.
After this came the second book (Thirteen Years Later) which built upon the success of the original and took it to a whole new level, so when this landed, I literally had to get my teeth into it after ripping the package open. Sadly, for me at any rate, this novel felt flat as we moved on to the next generation within, whist this was expected given the differences years wise from the previous two I didn’t feel that the new key principle cast members were as well rounded as the original two titles and as such made this feel quite flat. Add to this a quite demure pace and plot and sadly it was one that whilst I enjoyed really doesn’t compare to what has gone before on the same scale.
Don’t get me wrong, if you take this as a title on its own it is very good but when you compare it against its predecessors it really feels that either the timeline or the events weren’t sharp enough for the author to get a fuller plot from within. Personally I’d have perhaps dropped it and gone onto a whole new set of characters in a time that enthused me and utilised a diary from the previous characters to help bring things up to speed. But that’s just me. All in, this title was OK but nowhere near as good as the others, my only hope is that the fourth book will pick up the pace as well as round the characters out a little better.
BOOK BLURB:
Aleksandr made a silent promise to the Lord. God would deliver him - would deliver Russia - and he would make Russia into the country that the Almighty wanted it to be. He would be delivered from the destruction that wasteth at noonday, and from the pestilence that walketh in darkness - the terror by night...1825. Russia has been at peace for a decade. Bonaparte is long dead and the threat of invasion is no more. For Colonel Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov, life is calm. The French have been defeated, as have the twelve monstrous creatures he once fought alongside, and then against, all those years before. His duty is still to his tsar, Aleksandr the First, but today the enemy is merely human. However, the tsar himself knows he can never be at peace. He is well aware of the uprising fermenting within his own army, but his true fear is of something far more terrible - something that threatens to bring damnation upon him, his family and his country. Aleksandr cannot forget a promise: a promise sealed in blood...and broken a hundred years before. Now the victim of the Romanovs' betrayal has returned to demand what is his. The knowledge chills Aleksandr's very soul. And for Aleksei, it seems the vile pestilence that once threatened all he held dear has returned, thirteen years later.
REVIEW:
Fans of Jaspers original novel will be dying to get their hands on this offering and it pretty much brings back the horrific history of the Russian Napoleonic war as the principle protagonist returns to face the events that helped shaped Russia’s history. Personally I enjoyed Jaspers writing style but it is one that is a pretty hard slog and so will turn a number of readers off as they try to adjust to this almost Dickensian style that fits into the style of telling presented within. The dialogue is pretty good, the descriptiveness pretty straight forward as if the character thought that the tale was told just to those who were familiar with the area and of course we’re introduced to new characters to help our hero in the struggle ahead.
On a negative side however you really will have to have read the original to get the full benefit from this tale as otherwise you’ll be not only out in a Siberian Cold snap but left for dead pretty damn quick and possibly even mad with confusion as to what’s happening. I suspect its only down to myself refamiliarising myself with a reread of the original that allowed me to keep the idea’s fresh in my memory as I read this novel. Remember you’ve been warned.
