Alexia Tarabotti is a rather extraordinary woman living in an alternative Victorian England. Not only is she of the bluestocking variety of women, she is also soulless. In this alternate version of the nineteenth century, vampires and werewolves abound and are accepted by British society (it's a different matter entirely on the continent). Queen Victoria boasts regiments of werewolf soldiers who fight for the Empire and she relies upon the advice of her Shadow Council the leaders of which are a vampire and a werewolf.
The first book sees Alexia investigating the appearance of strange, unmannered and untutored vampires along with the gorgeous, beastly Lord Maccon (a werewolf) - their relationship develops considerably over the course of the book but will they come out of the adventure alive? There's a book 2 and a book 3 so I'm not giving away too many spoilers when I say that they do! Book 2 sees them both travel to Scotland to Lord Maccon's old werewolf pack - danger is everywhere as more than one attempt is made on Alexia's life but the reason for the attempts are unclear as she investigates the mysterious loss of werewolf-ness that the Scottish pack are suffering from. In Book 3, Alexia travels to Italy in order to try and find out more about her Soulless-ness which was inherited from her father (now dead) and once again her life is in terrible danger as vampires try to kill her and Templar knights hold her prisoner.
I enjoyed these books and so did my daughter. They're a funny, light hearted take on the supernatural genre set in Victorian London, without the need for the X rating that's sometimes required for these types of story (and that's why my 14 year was reading them!).
These are books 16, 17 and 18 for the Historical Reading Challenge.
Sounds good, I've been reading a few from the supernatural genre lately, so I'll try reading these as well.
Posted by: Pip | 15 July 2011 at 03:09 PM
They sound good. I'll have to see if they're available at our library.
Posted by: Carole | 16 July 2011 at 11:05 AM