Hill, Joey W. - The Vampire's Claim

[oyceter]

I blame this on Dear Author! They had previously written up some of Joey Hill's other books and mentioned that she does dominant women and submissive men, which is a huge chnage from so much published in romance.

The Vampire's Claim is set in the same world as the Dear Author reviewed books that intrigued me, The Vampire Queen's Servant and Mark of the Vampire Queen. It's set in 1950s Australia, when Lady Daniela (Danny) is trying to win back her territory from an evil vampire guy. She meets Devlin, an angsty guy, and ends up marking him as her servant (this takes several stages). Together, they fight crime they have a lot of explicit sex!

To begin with, I have zero knowledge of Australian vocabulary, so when I say it sounded very forced to me, I am basing this on nothing whatsoever. Dev is a quarter aboriginal Australian, although he has red hair and green eyes. I felt the use of his ancestry was extremely problematic; Hill refers mostly to his Scottish and Irish ancestry when she's talking about him and only notes his aboriginal ancestry when she goes on about how great he is at navigating the wilds of Australia and walkabout and what an awesome hunter he is blah blah blah. Also, she dresses the Japanese character Chiyoko in Japanese clothing... cheongsam. ?!?! I thought this might be a mistake, but Hill later refers to another character wearing Japanese-inspired clothes described as having a mandarin collar and frog closures. Hint: if something is "mandarin," it is NOT Japanese.

That said, I didn't actually get too mad at the book just because some of the writing was not so great. It is definitely not on the level of burping penises or spinning like a top while having sex, but a good deal of it is over the top, and I could have used with much less description of Danny's spun-gold hair and brilliant blue eyes.

Even so, the book is interesting. I like very much that Danny is the master in the relationship and Dev is the servant; there's a bit of non-consensual stuff going on that I'm not quite good with, but it is different in that it's a woman having the power to do something non-consensual to a man. I like that Danny's physical power is never downplayed, and that she is clearly dangerous and scary. On the other hand, I wasn't too caught up in the worldbuilding, and several of the sex scenes felt perfunctory, particularly the ones that include Lady Lyssa, the main character of the other vampire books.

So I'm not quite sure what to think! The book is extremely, extremely flawed, but on the other hand, it's also tackling things that I don't get to see very much in romance at all, which I like.

Comments

[svilleficrecs.livejournal.com]

None of the ones she's done for Heat have grabbed me. I highly recommend (as does just about everyone else) her "Natural Law" if you want a peek at her D/s chops.

[oyceter]

Ooo, I will check that out then.

[svilleficrecs.livejournal.com]

It's the number one recced one by her, by far. I've read bits of a couple others, but this one grabbed me, kept my interest all the way through, and not in a "accounting for the fact that it's a kinky erotic romance ebook (which it was, originally)" way, but in an "I'd easily read this published" way.

It doesn't have speculative elements, and I don't know if was juggling those or a requested tone shift for Berkley, or what, but the Vampire Queen's Servant didn't grab me enough for me to finish it. I mean, she can write sex, and D/s (in the same way I expect a level of competence from, say Emma Holly), but with Natural Law, the relationship and the situation gelled for me. It's intense w/ the D/s and BDSM in general stuff, but it actually coalesed into a plot and characters that hung together. I wasn't RIVETED by the plot, or how it turned out, but it was definitely a cut above most other romances I've read, print or ebook, even if you take the extreme BDSM elements and the uncommon emotional accuracy with which she applies them.

It's not a hyperrealistic documentary on sex/s&m clubs, but it manages to feel real way, way more than most books I've read do. And I fell for both the hero and the heroine. I look forward to seeing what you think. :)

[bravecows.livejournal.com]

Also, she dresses the Japanese character Chiyoko in Japanese clothing... cheongsam. ?!?! I thought this might be a mistake, but Hill later refers to another character wearing Japanese-inspired clothes described as having a mandarin collar and frog closures.

lololol SERIOUSLY? *shakes head*

[oyceter]

I know! It was so ridiculous that I couldn't even be mad!

[oracne.livejournal.com]

I read THE VAMPIRE QUEEN'S SERVANT in the hope I'd like the dominant vampire thing better if the vampire was female, but alas, no. I had the same issues as I did with alpha male books.

It had a lot of complex psychological stuff in it that I thought was interesting, though.

[oyceter]

Oh interesting! I do like that the woman is coded on top per the worldbuilding (which is also why I am sekritly fond of Anne Bishop's Black Jewels books), but I am still trying to figure out if there was just too much sex or I didn't connect with the characters or what. I think it's more the latter which made me feel like there was too much sex; Danny and Dev never felt like fully fleshed-out characters.

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much my reaction to all her books -- she does interesting stuff... but there's some other stuff which is problematic.

But yeah, race is really not a strong point. Lady Lyssa's full name is the most ridiculous of wapanese names ever.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

What's that?

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

Hang on, I need to find it in my archives. I blocked the monstrosity from my memory.

...

Ah, here we go: Lady Elyssa Amaterasu Yamato Wentworth

Yeah. I know.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

...dude! Overkill much?

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

Joey Hill seems to be very much about the overkill.

[oyceter]

O_O

O_O

O_O

....
wow

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

She's also an elf!

Well, part elf.

Oh, whatever. At this point, does it really matter?

[oyceter]

OMG! That was why she had pointy ears!

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

Yes!

[oyceter]

Yeah...

Although I finished the second mermaid book, and I liked that one a lot better. Also, her worldbuilding is almost manga-worthy in its over-the-top-ness! Sadly, so far it borders more on the Cross side of cracktastic (cracktastic and bad) instead of the Yuki Kaori side (so cracktastic it is awesome!).

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

I couldn't finish the first mermaid book because I found the couple dull (the innocent virgin heals world weary warrior storyline bores me to tears) but I did enjoy the second mermaid if only because it had a female tentacle monster. lol

Joey Hill is one of those writers who has ideas I like in general... but who goes in a different direction from where I wanted to go. Granted, I'm not exactly the target audience for erotica or what have you but with The Vampire Queen's Servant, I recall wanting so much more about the political infighting with the vampires because OMG! so awesome. But as it's erotica, the focus was not really on the political infighting between the vampires.

[oyceter]

Yeah, I read the review and thought it sounded boooring.

I.. yeah. I so far have not liked a lot of the erotica I've read, often because I feel the actual sex is much less sexy than intense longing and UST! And I think a lot of the ones I've read (and clearly I have not read a large sample) tend to not do sex + characterization as well, which I tend to look for.

See, if someone took Joey Hill and adapted it to multi-volume manga with volumes dedicated to cracktastic worldbuilding and dysfunctional relationships, I would eat that up!

[deepad]

if something is "mandarin," it is NOT Japanese

There is not enough facepalm in the world.

[oyceter]

I know! I could not even be offended because it was just so blatantly stupid!

[keilexandra]

Hmm. Joey Hill made it onto my autobuy list with the vampire books--I am SUCH a sucker for vampires--but I am less immediately grabbed by the description of A VAMPIRE'S CLAIM. Still buying it because I loved Danny's brief appearance in the previous books, so we'll see. Power dynamics are one of my major kinks (not just in romance but in general, cf. TIGANA), and the BDSM icing on top of passable prose is rare.

I didn't read her mermaid books because animalistic (right word?) sex squicks me. Will have to check out NATURAL LAW, though.

[oyceter]

Heeeee. I think I overdosed on vampires back in high school (oh LJ Smith. Oh Anne Rice. Oh Christopher Pike. Oh other authors I cannot remember and just read because there were vampires!).

I don't know if the first mermaid book has mermaid sex (although there is pixie sex!), but the second mostly has sex scenes when Mina is in human form. I think in one she has her tentacles, but since they correspond fairly closely with legs (she has two), it actually didn't bother me as much as I thought it would.

And I very much like that Hill makes her un-beautiful, and not with the half-measures of "I had a terrible scar when I was young and think I'm ugly but oh hey, it's totally faded now and just makes me look rakish."