Cat Crawfield seems invincible a half-vampire, half-human woman who works as a vampire slayer for the government. Four years have passed since the events in the previous book (Halfway to the Grave), and she's been trying to move her life
forward after having left her vampire lover, Crispin Randall (known as "Bones", although the
origins of this name aren't explained in this book). When Cat finds that she's
the target of an assassin, she teams up with Bones again to try to find out who's trying to kill her. Cat now has her own team of humans
to help her in her vampire slaying, and she has to overcome their prejudices against the undead as well as her own negative feelings towards Bones' former lovers.
There's plenty of action in this book - Cat's an
(almost) invincible fighter, although the battles she's in contain more realism than some
- people do actually get injured. She's a lively and interesting character, too, although she tends to leap into situations without properly reflecting on them. Cat's vampire-hating mother
makes a brief appearance, an amusing cameo but mostly about vampire politics, fights, Cat and Bones' relationship,
and Cat's thirst for vengeance against her father.
Some of Bones' dialogue feels awkward - he uses English slang, but sometimes it doesn't quite sound authentic to these English ears. He's also slightly nebulous as a character - I didn't feel I really got to know him in the same way that I learned about the other characters. This issue
is perhaps addressed in the previous book in the series, which I haven't read, but it doesn't really detract from this story too much.
Still, I loved this book, finding it well-paced and interesting with some good characters and well-thought-out vampire lore underpinning the events. It's inspired me to pick up the first in the series, and I certainly look forward to the next offering from this author.