Dark Desire

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Summary: Terrific 2nd Novel In The Carpathian Series - A Must Read!
Review: "Dark Desire" is the second book in Christine Feehan's Carpathian series. This novel stands alone and it is not necessary to read the first book to appreciate this one - although I think you will enjoy it more if you do. Carpathians are a unique race of beings, originating in Romania's Carpathian Mountains, who have existed since humans first inhabited the earth. They are definitely not vampires. They are, however, a different race than man, gifted with the ability to change shape, fly, and move faster than the eye can see - and also able to communicate through both telepathy and language. Acquiring sustenance from human and/or animal blood, they do not kill or turn people into vampires. Carpathians mate for life but since the females rarely live to adulthood, and their childrens' mortality rate is high, not many males are able to find a female suitable for a lifemate....or any female at all. The women provide the light to the males' darker side. After 200 years, the Carpathian male loses all human feelings, unless he has a mate. The race is dying out and many males, having lived for centuries without wives, often choose to end their existence or turn rogue, (vampire), in despair.

Jacques Dubrinsky, a brooding and once powerful Carpathian, was betrayed to vampire hunters who tortured and imprisoned him in chains where he has remained for seven years. His memory gone, Jacques' shattered mind reaches out in agony and finally manages to establish a connection with dedicated American surgeon Shea O'Halloran. His voice haunts her dreams and finally she feels compelled to find his place of imprisonment and try to save his life. Her compassion, courage and ability to love will return Jacques to sanity and restore his memory if anything or anyone is able. Shea has a rare blood disease and needs constant blood transfusions to remain alive.

Shea does find Jacques but they are both in terrible danger. They must deal with Jacques' past and also Shea's - which is much more unusual than she knows. Also, the evil men, and vampire, who originally tried to take Jacques' life are hot on their trail, as are his Carpathian family. They believed he was dead and now want to help both Jacque and Shea.

This is an extremely exciting and imaginative novel. The romance is sensual and scorchingly hot, but violent at times - remember, Jacques is not quite sane at first - also the descriptions of his torture are graphic. Ms. Feehan brings back characters from her first Carpathian novel and introduces others. These creatures, (beings?), are wonderful - certainly enough so that most women would offer up their necks without a qualm. Highly recommended. I can't wait to read the next Carpathian novel.
JANA


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Summary: maybe Feehan isn't so bad after all...
Review: I've only read one of Feehan's books before, _Dark Magic_, and I didn't really like it. The hero, Gregori, was domineering to a fault, the heroine was a bit of an idiot, and the writing was repetitive. In spite of my feelings about that book, I decided to try Feehan's immensely popular series again. This time, I somehow managed to pick a book a little more to my tastes. In this book, Shea O'Halloran, a young doctor, has been having dreams about a man in terrible pain. She goes to the Carpathian Mountains, the land of her birth, in order to escape men who seem to believe that she is a vampire. While there, Shea finds the man from her dreams, who at first attacks her out of a mistaken belief that she is the cause of his pain. Shea tries to heal this man, Jacques, and, in spite of herself, she begins to fall in love with him. Jacques believes that she is his lifemate, the only one who can keep the madness within him at bay. He would stop at nothing to protect her from the men who want to hurt her and the vampire who wants to claim her as his own, the same vampire who betrayed him (Jacques). For those of you familiar with the series, this book also has Mikhail, Raven, Gregori, and Byron (who I'm including in this list, although I'm not sure if he's ever in another book).

Because of my previous experience with this series, I was a little wary about reading this book, but, for me, this book was a whole lot better than _Dark Magic_. Jacques is domineering, yes, but Shea can, for the most part, hold her own against him, since his will often seems to turn to putty around her. I really enjoyed the story itself, even though the human villain characters were once again like cardboard cutouts of Badness. The writing seemed less repetitive than in _Dark Magic_, where references to the main characters often involved the use of the same words, over and over again. Shea was in some serious denial, though - it seemed like it took her forever to realize that Jacques was not just a man with a serious blood disorder, even though he drank glasses of blood and survived for years with a stake through his chest. Still, this book was pretty enjoyable, and I think I'll try to find more books in this series that I can like as much, or more, than this one.

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Summary: Totally erotic
Review: Once I picked it up, I couldn't put it down until I turned the last page. This is one of the most erotic books I have ever read. Romance, intrigue, drama, and suspence is what you will find plenty of in this book. I will now read all of the other books in the dark series written by Christine Feehan.

Rating:
Summary: Wild, Scary and Immensely Sensual Ride
Review: Dark Desire is Christine Feehan�s second novel in the marvelous Dark series, and it is even more intense than the first.

Jacques has been a powerful protector of his people, the Carpathians of Eastern Europe, for hundreds of years. He uses his enormous supernatural mental and physical powers to hunt and destroy vampires and to protect the weak. However, his abilities to see colors and to feel emotions have withered. He�s trapped in a bleak, solitary existence, for he has not found his lifemate�the one female who is the other half of his soul, the light to his darkness. His predatory instincts have intensified, and his darkness threatens to overwhelm him so that he is close to turning into a vampire. He must find his mate soon.

To make matters worse, evil human vampire hunters are convinced he is a vampire. With the help of a mysterious vampire who hates Jacques, the humans catch and torture Jacques mercilessly, driving a stake near his heart and burying him alive. Jacques manages to live on for seven years, attracting small animals into his coffin and drinking their blood for sustenance. His hatred of his torturers and his need for revenge are a growing cancer in his soul that keeps him alive.

During this time Jacques is mentally aware of a human woman, a doctor whom he thinks is linked to the group that tortured him. In his extreme state of weakness, she is the only person left that he can contact through his mind. He often inflicts his pain on her, enraged that she refuses to come free him�seeing this as evidence of her guilt.

Shea O�Halloran is a gifted American surgeon, full of goodness and compassion for her patients. She is puzzled as to why she is sometimes seized with pain and often has dreams in which she sees a man�s tortured face. She has always been a loner, afraid of contact with others because of the bizarre blood disorder she has been unable to identify or cure. She often requires transfusions to stay alive. She decides to go the Carpathian mountains, the birthplace of the father she never knew, in order to further her research in the hope of finding a cure for her condition.

Instead, she is drawn to a hidden cellar where she finds Jacques buried! Although he attacks her, she rescues him and nurses him back to health. Jacques comes to realize that she is not one of his tormentors but the lifemate he�d been searching for over centuries. He possessively burns for her and can barely prevent himself from claiming her, body and soul, against her will.

Shea is horrified to feel such a strong pull to Jacques. And not only because he�s lost all memory of his life prior to his burial and is violent and unpredictable. Mostly she fears ever to love or to need anyone. For the intensity with which her own mother obsessed over Shea�s absent father led her to be a terrible mother and finally to commit suicide.

Shea and Jacques are forced to deal not only with the tremendous electric sensuality and fear between them but also with others appearing in their lives who may or may not be vampires. And the danger that Jacques�who is now more beast than man�will kill them or Shea is ever present. As Jacques begins to remember his past and to heal both physically and emotionally, his skills are taxed to the limit, as are Shea�s.

Dark Desire is a wild, scary and immensely sensual ride that grows ever more intense as danger mounts and Shea and Jacques grow to fervently love each other. I didn�t mind that the mysterious villain is easy to guess because the action and emotion are so intense that every page is a thoroughly entertaining adventure.