Review: Masquerade (Vampires Realm Romance Series #10) by F. E. Heaton

TLDR recap:

Sophis and Vivek have been dancing the thin line between love and hate, passion and murder, since an incident with vampire hunters ten years before nearly took their lives. Now, they’ve been thrust together for the Creator Day masquerade, a night when all vampires can let their hair down, their fangs out, and boogie-woogie with anyone they choose. And that boogie-woogie madness includes the dance that takes place without pants. Things get hot, then dangerous, as conspiracies fly fast and thick as discarded underpants. Will Sophis and Vivek survive the attacks, the politics, and the heat of their desire for each other? Masquerade is a GraveTells Must Read!

• Title: Masquerade
• Series: Vampire Realm Romance Series
• Author: Felicity Heaton
• Prominent Characters: Sophis, Vivek
• Recommended reader age: 18+
• Sexual content level: High, with language seen in erotica (yeah, baby!)

*** This review is SPOILER-FREE! Read on with confidence! ***

Thoughts:

Whew. Felicity knows how to write a damned good story. I didn’t want to put this one down. I’ve only read her two short Vampire Erotic Theater novellas (Covet and Crave)  before this book, but when she offered it to me, I jumped on it like a starving chocoholic let loose in the Hershey’s factory.

This is book 10 in her Vampire Realm Romance Series. Now, about this series, there’s a few things you should know:

1) The vampires in this book /series lean way more toward Lestat than Louis. And I don’t mean poor whiny baby Lestat afraid of helicopters sitting around in moldy clothes and starving. I mean bad ass, killing whores, changing 6 year old little girls to torment his lover/companion, eating old ladies and their foppish boy toys out in the gardens Lestat. You feelin’ me?

These vampires will eat you, kick you in the face, and laugh about how you squiggled and squirmed.

2) The sex is hot and graphic. I look forward to these scenes a little too much. Is there a 12 step program for Erotica Addiction? Well, if there is, please help me hide from the orderlies in your basement. With my Kindle. I love smut, and Felicity delivers.

3) There is gore and violence, so these books are definitely leaning more toward the “Horror PNR” than straight fru-fru PNR. So, if you’re squicked by blood, guts, and battle, well, maybe not for you.

Alright, on to reviewerly things.  This being book 10 in a series made me a little nervous. I’m just OCD enough to want to read every book, in order, before I’ll read another farther down the line, regardless of whether I’m told I can read them out of order or not. But Felicity assured me I could read this as a stand alone, and since I’m pretty sure she’s got some kind of direct link into my brain with her story telling, I said, “What the hell, it’s a free ARC. I can just lock the door eight times, wash my hands while singing ‘Twinkle Twinkle’, spin in a circle, and refold all my panties to overcome my OCD nonsense. I can do it.”

So glad I did. The story line is tight, fast, and action packed in more ways than one. There isn’t any sex in here for the sake of sex, and when you finally get to it, you’re so damned happy and relieved for the couple. I loved the main characters in this book, and enjoyed their verbal sparring, the machinations of their superiors and friends to nudge them to the inevitable, and the big battle at the end of the book. I had no desire to root for the humans at all. LOL. I happily watched them get slaughtered and wished I was out on the field with our couple to give them a big fist bump before flying away on my pet dragon so they couldn’t eat me. (Hey, combat burns a lot of energy and calories. I don’t wanna be their snack.)

There are appearances by characters from the earlier books, and the breakdown of different houses within the vampire society confused me a bit here and there, but I think that is because I tend to read very fast and will skim names of things like countries, characters I don’t like and hope to see get killed, overly expensive automobiles, and caste system naming conventions. (Only the society names were in the book, not the other stuff.)

The downside to this book for me was keeping the castes of vampires straight and the large cast of characters – like I said, peeps from earlier books show up. For fans of the series who have been following it, I think they’ll be thrilled to see old friends and get some possible foreshadowing for future lurve for some of the guys and gals that don’t have a twue wuve yet. So, I’m sitting here wanting all the other books now, because I’m intrigued about the characters I met in this one and want to know their stories too. Then I can come back and read this one again and feel all “Squee!” about seeing a series favorite pop up.

Memorable quotes:

Now this is the way to tell a woman you love her, y’all….

“I cannot promise that things between us will be easy, or that we won’t fight at times, but I can promise you that I love you… I love you so much that it drives me crazy… it makes me do stupid things… but I am trying harder to be a good man for you, one who knows the right responses to his feelings and makes you feel loved and cherished. This is real, and I will prove it to you every night until you believe it is more than a fantasy… and that it is more than fleeting.”

If you liked Masquerade of the Vampires Realm Romance series…

I recommend any of Felicity Heaton’s other books. You can’t go wrong, I promise you. Get thee to Amazon and download! She’s even got a couple titles really discounted or free on there. 🙂  Who doesn’t love a free book? Okay, well, sometimes they suck, but Felicity’s won’t! You can read the reviews of her Vampire Erotic Theater series books Covet and Crave by clicking.

For hot, steamy, stubborn characters that you know are going to light crap on fire with their lovin’, check out Nalini Singh’s Guild Hunters series, starting with Angel’s Blood. You can read my review of it here. It remains one of my all time favorite books eva!

Final thoughts:

With passion, danger, excitement, characters who draw you in and make you ache for them, Masquerade is a book you’ll want to revisit over and over. I thoroughly enjoyed the ride! I think you will too, and if you’re not a fan of Felicity Heaton, you will be after reading this installment. Sophis and Vivek butted heads *eye brow waggle* in more ways than one, but their sparring never felt forced, nor did the eventual realizations by both parties that they were fighting for the wrong reasons. Their journey from estranged friends to lovers felt natural and incredibly satisfying. I really loved this book!

Rating: Masquerade