"Romance Laced with History and Horror"

1840: Magdelena Montgomery's lover is murdered by group vampyre hunters which included her own father. The pair had been experimenting with the theory that their love could make him mortal once more. The effort had cost him his existance and changed Maggie's life forever.

Present Day: Murder and a trail of blood leads New Orleans Detective Sean Canady right to Maggie's door. The owner of an exclusive boutique, Maggie is an unlikely suspect, but she has a secret.

It doesn't take Maggie long to surmise that her soul and Sean's are intertwined. She believes they have loved in a past life, that Sean is the reincarnation of another Sean Canady. His had been cut short, by one too evil to contemplate. She is strangely drawn to him and he to her.

As prostitutes keep turning up dead, Maggie begins to suspect that it is the work of another vampire. The killer has wreaked havoc throughout history, and his ripperesque style had been infamous at one time.

Knowing that the murderer's M.O. could expose the entire vampire community, Maggie is determined to work with Sean to uncover the killer's identity, and destroy him once and for all. But matters become complicated when the Vampire King arrives to remind Maggie of the code that they all must "live" by. She cannot destroy the killer without consent of the vampire community.

Can Maggie and Sean get it right this time around? Can they destroy their enemy and fulfill their destiny. Can Sean's love return Maggie's morality.

I will be the first to admit to not being a horror fan. I love vampire romances, but if the romance edges too close to the horror genre, it is probably not for me. BENEATH A BLOOD RED MOON is classified as Romantic Suspense which would indicate that a reader such as myself should proceed with caution.

The prologue was a turn off. The brutal murder of Maggie's vampire lover took place while they were making love. You would have thought the shock of the whole thing would have made the Maggie swear off men for life. Yet she readily forgave her father and fell in love with one of the other killers' (Canady) descendants.

I didn't care for the hero, reincarnated or not. The man was a borderline rapist. He forces himself on Maggie after she say's no. Maggie winds up capitulating, making it merely forced seduction, but then she tells him it was a mistake. What does he do? He insults her, in an extremely juvenile and vulgar manner. . Is this acceptable behavior for a police officer or any man for that matter? The Vampire King was too passive for my liking as well.

I also thought there were too many extraneous side characters. I could buy the reincarnation of Sean, but the others didn't add anything to the plot. In fact the whole crew of friends weren't much good for anything other than hostages.

If anything I would have preferred the reincarnation of the murdered lover (hokey though it would have been); he seemed to have been the only decent man in the whole story. Though this particular story is not for me, it is part of a trilogy, and I as I said before I love vampire romance so I am willing to give this author another try. If you enjoy a romance laced with horror BENEATH A BLOOD RED MOON should fit the bill.

Leslie Tramposch / October, 1999
Copyright © 1999 for PNR Reviews

Reviewed by Leslie Tramposch
Courtesy PNR Reviews
Posted October 22, 2001

Summary

Maggie Montgomery owned a very elegant boutique in New Orleans. Her life was filled with creating clothing women wanted to be seen in, her friends, and a dark secret. When someone kills a local small-time pimp and leaves a blood trail leading right up to her doorway, she suddenly finds herself the object of intense interest--both personal and professional--to Det. Sean Canady. But the killing doesn't stop there, and it's compounded when Maggie figures out its really another vampire whose method of killing could expose the whole vampire culture. Fate had brought them together, but someone was determined to tear them apart. As Maggie and Sean work together to figure out who was killing prostitutes she begins to believe that she and Shane had known and loved each other in another time, only to be torn apart by an soul so evil even Maggie shudders at the thought of him. However, that isn't the least of her problems; Maggie's mentor and Vampire King enters the picture, reminding her of the laws of their kind which forbid her to kill the killer without council approval. Would her and Sean's love be strong enough this time to defeat the evil killer and possibly, somehow, make her mortal again?