Blood Born, Renee Lake

Caution, mild spoilers ahead.

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions included in this review are my own and are in no way affected by the exchange.

I have a big problem with this book.

I wanted to read something in a horror genre and, even though it was stated that it is for teens and YA, I didn’t mind if it would be milder than a horror book for a more grown-up population.

What I did mind was that it had simple writing wrapping a childish story with shallow characters that didn’t have any background or a major development in the story. But in midst of all this, there are scenes of sex, murder, and violence, far from appropriate in a book for teens and YA.

I think this book was labeled badly in its genre, and it should be more of paranormal or erotica. The thing though, that even then, the characters would be too dull, the story too simple and predictable. There was no real love-story, only a new try at this phenomenon in modern literature known as instalove and, on top of it, with the older one in the couple treating the younger one as property.

If you can close your eyes on all this for a moment, or more like the whole book, there is an interesting world hidden, with another dive into vampire culture. Some of the things are old and known from classics like Dracula, others are new and surprising.

I love when the author is not scared to kill a character or a few, even if it is a teen & YA novel. But for a horror genre, there was not enough of any kind of scary thing happening to install the feeling of fear or horror.

All in all, it is a new look on already known world, that is charming, addicting, but hard to see through all the bad writing and the world that is not developed enough.