Julie Flanders

First I have to say that I usually never read vampire books. In the last 20 years most of them are about sex and no real story. Polar Night is definitely NOT like those. It has a very refreshing story line.

Two men: one a murderer, one a cop. Both have had tragedies in their past and lost someone dear to them. Aleksei's tragedy was losing his unrequited love over 100 years ago. Since then he has been obsessed with replacing her. Danny Fitzpatrick is a Detective with the Fairbanks police department. He lost his wife not long ago to a murderer in Chicago.

Danny is working on a cold case, a blond haired, tall, thin woman was taken a few years ago and the case was never solved. Then a woman that fits the same description is kidnapped out of a store parking lot. Danny thinks this is too much of a coincidence. He finds a woman who escaped from an attacker and she fits the same description and has some unusual impressions of her would be kidnapper. They join together and find a never ending nightmare. Danny has a reputation as a lush so no one at the precinct believes him when he draws his conclusions.

Aleksei has been trying to find a replacement for his very first love and it is not working out well. He desperately wants a love that will become his Natasha. He has been looking for the last 100 years and has failed. Many look like Natasha but none are truly like her.

Julie Flanders does a great job of intertwining the past and present of both Danny and Aleksei. The reader goes from both characters darkest days to each of them taking hold of their lives and moving forward. I felt the way she wrote the ending was really classy as well. Polar Nights is not your average vampire story.

I received this book through Freado.com in return for a review. If you want to learn more about Julie's other books check out http://julieflanders.blogspot.com/… (más)

This book had a lot more adventure and romance than I originally expected. There are two story lines in this book: Hannah's and Stella's. Hannah lives presently in the Boston area and Stella who exists presently in her afterlife, but lived in 1884. Hannah is about 32 in the book, stuck in a relationship with a jerk of a man. Stella is about 20 in the story of her life in 1884, stuck in an awful marriage to a man twice her age who physically and mentally abuses her.

Both of these women connect, although they cannot really communicate, based on shared life experiences.

"Once again, Hannah felt an inexorable tie to Stella. She knew exactly how it felt to lose both parents at the same time. She was just glad she had been old enough to take care of herself when her loss had happened. And that she lived in an era where an independent woman was not a rarity and a woman living on her own was considered acceptable. Stella had no such luxury" (193).

This was a book that I read through very quickly as there were small adventures that were all pieces to a bigger adventure. The romance seed was planted early on and was not rushed or out of context, it fit in perfectly, beautifully. Unfortunately, it is a tragic love story and I would be lying if I said that I wasn't devastated with the ending of Christopher's storyline.

Please note: I received this copy of "The Ghosts of Aquinnah" for free through Goodreads First Reads.… (más)