Why am I passionate about this?
Ever since I was a kid using all of my allowance to buy comic books, I have been obsessed with the art and craft of storytelling, especially those stories that deal with the struggle between good and evil—in the world, and inside ourselves. I’ve been fortunate enough to publish short stories and now a novel in the fantasy genre. But most of all, I am a fan of speculative fiction, and especially urban fantasy, with its blending of the real and impossible, and I’m always eager to see what’s around the next dark corner or down the next mysterious alley in the hidden heart of the world.
David's book list on blending the real with the fantastic
Why did David love this book?
My wife first turned me on to the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series, for which I am forever grateful. Smart, passionate and endlessly resourceful, Anita is one of my favorite characters in modern fantasy fiction.
I like to think of her as being, if not the spiritual sister to the protagonist of my own novel, at least her great-auntie. A necromancer working in St. Louis, Anita regularly deals with the resurrected dead and the undead, as part of both her professional and (increasingly complicated) personal life.
The slam-bang pacing of this first book in the series makes it hard to put down, as Anita gets drawn deeper into a web of lies and murder involving the local vampire community, but manages to come out on top.
8 authors picked Guilty Pleasures as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Meet Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, in the first novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling series that "blends the genres of romance, horror and adventure with stunning panache"(Diana Gabaldon).
Laurell K. Hamilton's bestselling series has captured readers' wildest imaginations and addicted them to a seductive world where supernatural hungers collide with the desires of the human heart, starring a heroine like no other...
Anita Blake is small, dark, and dangerous. Her turf is the city of St. Louis. Her job: re-animating the dead and killing the undead who take things too far. But when the city's most powerful vampire…