Review: The Bite of Silence (Biting Love 2.5) by Mary Hughes

Synopsis (via Goodreads):

Times Square on New Year’s Eve. A million partiers chanting the final seconds. This year, it’s a countdown to death.

My name is Twyla Tafel and I’ve uncovered an insane plot to unleash berserk vampires on those unsuspecting revelers. I have to stop it, armed only with my great admin skills, my useless art degree—and Nikos, a severely hot vampire who I’d love to photograph as a Spartan king roaring his muscular challenge at the Persians.

But Nikos has issues, if you know what I mean. Roadblocks in his psyche that say stop when all I want is go-go-go. See “severely hot”, above.

Although if I finally break through Nikos’s reserve, I may get more than I bargained for. He’s seriously big, seriously built, and more than just a tad dominant. Still, it’s time to push my limits and find out who I really am, so I’m willing to try…I think. I’m sure. I’m mostly sure. Until he starts stalking me with those sable bedroom eyes and long, sharp fangs—!

My Thoughts: I picked up this book as a free download from Amazon back in December and I didn't realize it until after I started reading it last night that it's the 2nd (and a half) in a series.  Unfortunately, this left me floundering a bit as I tried to figure out who was who and why they were doing what they were doing.

While I enjoyed both the idea behind the story and the writing style, I have to admit that one thing that makes me twitch is when a character talks in slang to the point where I don't understand what they're trying to say.  Twyla's best friend Nixie (who I assume was the main character in book 2, Biting Nixie) was practically unintelligible to me.  Fortunately, her interactions with Twyla are fairly limited because I don't know if I could have waded through much more than we were given.  To be fair, this is one of my pet quirks and might not bother anyone else at all but it took me out of the story in a big way.

As for Twyla, I had a hard time figuring out why she kept describing things in such an off the wall way.  She noted Nikos' lips as being umber colored more than once.  It wasn't until it was spelled out to me that she's a photographer and sees things with an artist's eye that I began to understand.  Yes, I am occasionally slow.

Nikos, on the other hand, would not be allowed anywhere near my girl parts.  Not because he's grody or anything but just because anyone whose claim to fame is that he's twice the size of a normal man needs to keep his horse sized man parts to himself.  Because, ouch.

I think I would have enjoyed this a lot more if I had read the first two books.  Things happened quickly and characters popped in that I never quite got the feel for.  Reading the beginning of the series likely would have given me more of a base to stand on as far as the events in this story are concerned.

More books by Mary Hughes

Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.