Hunter's Hope

November 8, 2021
Bestseller Day’s lackluster second Vampire Motorcycle Club paranormal romance (after Bane’s Choice) brings together a newly turned vampire and a woman with special abilities of her own. Hunter Evans has only been a vampire for three weeks and is still learning to control his powers. When he meets quirky whirlwind Alice Darlington, who can talk to ghosts and communicate psychically with animals, he feels drawn to her in a way he can’t explain, leading to possessive, borderline stalker-ish behavior that will turn off some readers. Alice’s abilities make her a target for the Chamber, the organization that governs the warlocks and hopes to subjugate all other supernatural beings. It sends a dragon to spy on Alice by posing as a rescue dog—but as Alice cares for the adorable dragon, the pair become friends and she wins him to her side. When Hunter and his new vampire family learn of threat, they’ll do whatever it takes to keep Alice safe. The supernatural politics have promise, but the rushed romance hits every cliché in the book, lending the love story a phoned-in quality. Still, the side characters are strong and there’s plenty of setup for things to come. Readers will hope for a return to form in the next installment. Agent: Kevan Lyon, Marsal Lyon Literary.

February 1, 2022
A newly turned vampire finds romance, family, and danger in this fantasy sequel. In Savannah, Georgia, firefighter Hunter Evans died saving a child's life. Bane, leader of the Vampire Motorcycle Club, then bit his friend, inviting him to the land of the undead. Three weeks later, Hunter struggles against drinking blood from a living victim rather than a blood bag. After fellow vamp Luke Calhoun helps him curb his thirst, Hunter bumps into the enchanting Alice Darlington, who runs the Little Darlings Rescue shelter. Though her specialty is animals, Alice can also sense and communicate with the dead. She assumes Hunter is a ghost and offers him an appointment. Later, at Bane's mansion, Hunter waxes poetic about Alice to his supernatural family, including the wealthy Meara Delacourt. To encourage his pursuit, she donates $100,000 to Alice's shelter. Meara delivers Alice the check, then accompanies Hunter and his potential love to a restaurant to get to know her better. Alice still isn't fully convinced her new friends are vampires until a ghost appears. The spectral flapper tells Alice: "They want you to die." A deeper entanglement soon reaches out from her past. Dr. Hanford Kurchausen, head of an institute for "mentally disturbed individuals" where Alice spent eight years, wants her powers to serve him again. In her sequel, Day sips long on the warmth and camaraderie found in seminal genre series like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Twilight. For the first third of the novel, the adventure focuses on Hunter and Alice as they find their places among the growing supernatural cast, which includes dragon-in-disguise Charlie, posing as a golden retriever. Hunter and Alice are well matched, he being the classic "nice guy" and she recovering from an old trauma. Yet his vampire lust runs hot in lines like "Every inch of his new body wanted to jump on her and take and take and take. Her mouth, her body, her blood." Behind Kurchausen is the broader villainy of Lord Alastair Neville, ruler of the warlocks of the Chamber, to be addressed in the next installment. Larger plots percolate while new characters shine in this fantasy series entry.

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