Title: A Taint in the BloodAuthor: S.M. StirlingYear of Publication: 2010Publisher: ROCPage count: 432The story opens with Ellen crying in her car because she’d just broken up with Adrian due to his lack of communication in the relationship. Almost immediately she’s kidnapped by the guy’s twin sister, Adrienne.Adrienne describes herself, while kidnapping Ellen, as Adrian’s evil twin. Proving that in fact Adrian was holding things back, severely; during the relationship if Ellen was unaware he even had a twin sister. Adrienne is a complete sociopath and has decided for some reason or another to piss off her brother by snatching Ellen, she comes out from California to Santa Fe, making it very obvious she was there by being intentionally caught on surveillance cameras. Both Adrian and Adrienne are “Shadowspawn” not exactly vampires, not exactly shape shifters and not exactly dead… but choose all the things you like from each of the above categories and combine them into one creature and you have “Shadowspawn.” Essentially at this point we have these were-vampire twins with these powers and the ability to push likelihoods to turn out in their favor. Adrian, who was trying to deny his Shadowspawn side by living like a recluse in Santa Fe and Adrienne, the opposite, lives entirely instinctively, where whatever feels good and would make her happy is indulged.The intent of the kidnapping is unclear, maybe an attempt to bring her twin back to the Shadowspawn side of things, but it’s really not well explained. Ellen’s whisked away to California and fed upon by the sexually and otherwise sadistic Adrienne regularly. She’s living in this terribly creepy community made entirely of people who either serve or feed Adrienne, and all the people living there are entirely mentally raped into thinking that what they’re experiencing is a good thing.Adrian, of course, follows them to rescue his ex-girlfriend and stakes out the compound for a number of months. During his stake out Adrian even meets with Ellen both physically and in a weird dream-state. He woos her again; they fall back into love and even get engaged during these brief meetings. Though, since Adrienne is able to read Ellen’s mind when she’s close enough, Adrian enables her mind to forget the meetings until they are face to face again, sending Ellen without any knowledge or hope of the impending rescue back into hell. Why Stirling doesn’t just have Adrian rescue the girl during one of the numerous face to face meetings, I don’t understand. From my point of view, putting Ellen through the months of sadistic emotional, sensory and psychological torture for a flimsy excuse of using Ellen during the ambush to help kill his twin is pointless. The ending fell flat for me; it happened with no reason as to why that was the appropriate setting and I feel the same result could have been accomplished at any point during the story. I guess the ending wasn’t executed well enough for me to make it plausible, even in an urban fantasy setting. Overall the story was interesting, if slightly disturbing, and despite the lack of reasoning and coherency in many of the main characters actions it was a good read. I’d like to see if the story is given a sequel if it fleshes out a bit more. I can't believe the same author wrote the "Dies the Fire" series - those books were so amazingly well written. I had a really hard time getting through this book. Maybe there is a book prior to this one that explains the Shadowspawn?!? I was lost during a lot of the book. Perspective was switched without *any* notice. It just didn't flow for me. I already have the second book in the series and am going to attempt to start it - but if it is anything like the first I may not attempt to finish it - and I've never left a book unread...
What do You think about A Taint In The Blood (2010)?
This was a terrible book full of cheap thrills. I love that kind of thing sometimes.
—Rafiana
A good, darker vampire story -- definitely not Sookie Stackhouse here!
—Monie
didn't finish. just couldn't get into it.
—jacksparrow
