Review: Nightlife

Title: Nightlife

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Author: Rob Thurman

Synopsis:

Welcome to the Big Apple. There's a troll under the Brooklyn Bridge, a boggle in Central Park, and a beautiful vampire in a penthouse on the Upper East Side---and that's only the beginning. Of course, most humans are oblivious to the preternatural nightlife around them, but Cal Leandros is only half human.

His father's dark lineage is the stuff of nightmares---and he and his entire otherworldly race are after Cal. Why? Cal hasn't exactly wanted to stick around long enough to find out. He and his half brother, Niko, have managed to stay a step ahead for four years, but now Cal's dad has found them again. And Cal is about to learn why they want him, why they've always wanted him: He is the key to unleashing their hell on earth. The fate of the human world will be decided in the fight of Cal's life....

I've been reading first person POV books since I picked up Laurell K. Hamilton's Guilty Pleasures when I was twelve. I fell in love with the style then, but over the years it was rare to find an author who could really pull of the style of writing.

Rob Thurman made me fall back in love with first person, frankly. I read it in 24 hours, and it took me that long because I had to sleep. She weaved sarcastic observations with beautiful prose with such ease, it felt completely natural. One such passage was:

A morning mist dissipating in the rising sun. A broken bird plunging from the sky. A scuttling dark thing fleeing the light of day. Shit, I should've been writing some of this down. Dying really brought out the poet in me. (Page 2 of Nightlife)

There's plenty of action in this book and I love that she actually didn't use a lot of cuss words in the book, and when she did, it helped build the characters and their personalities. Cal is impatient, but lazy, slightly self-loathing but not in a annoying way, and purely because he knows what he's capable of. But he's also in control enough that he ignores that and keeps going. He wants roots, not so much for himself as for his brother--which is admirable. I like that he goes against his brother because he knows that Niko deserves better than constantly moving around.

I'd love to see more with Cal and Georgina, especially considering her role in everything but I can understand why there was very little of that. (I do have hopes for the rest of the books, as well as Niko and Promise.) I tend to prefer more romantic elements in what I read, but wow I barely even missed it in with this book.

And then there's Robin. Robin Goodfellow, a puck, used carsalemen (really, Ms. Thurman, perfect job for him. Seriously.) and unwilling/willing sidekick to Niko and Cal--caught completely by surprise and drawn into everything because he's lonely and, frankly I think because it cannot ever get boring with Cal and Niko! He's my kind of guy--perpetually dirty minded (I love the constant jokes at Niko's expense.), generally out for himself but has rare moments of heroism, and completely in love with himself. He was the comedic relief, and I just adored him.

I'm going to stop gushing here, because you should go and buy this book! I'm going to be on the lookout for the rest of them and I'll be buying them as soon as humanly possible.

Side note: As a die-hard fangirl of Supernatural, I want to mention that if, gods forbid, Supernatural gets cancelled, my squealing obsession will then be transferred to Cal and Niko. You cannot get a higher judgement from me!

Rating: 5 Stars

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