Chicago…three artistic dead souls…and
one outsider
Terence, Edward, and Maria, three need-to-be friends brought together by fate, all
distinct in character: Terence, macho biker with the looks any woman fantasizes a lover to possess; Edward, a lost soul still
searching for his place in this trio of destruction; Maria, the woman who controls and sets the rules for the other two.
Their binding tie? The obsessive need to hunt…for human blood.
Unlike other vampire books I have read, Rick Reed’s “In The Blood”
offers you a side of these creatures that almost ‘humanizes’ them. Their hunger is not only for blood to sustain
their lifespan but also the need to be left alone, to dwell on past memories of artistic appreciation each possessed but now
lost and kept alive through the paintings donned in their home. Reed’s talented writing voice gives us glimpses into
each of these characters lives; their likes and dislikes, the animosity kept at bay between the two males, the angst to remember
what it was like to possess artistic human wants.
Elise Groneman, an artist who shuns her disappointments in broken relationships
by brushing her feelings onto a canvas, unknowingly has been chosen as the one human who possibly may have the power to instill
the artistic passion the vampires once felt.
What the trio do not realize, however, is that Elise also holds the key to their possible
destruction of peaceful unity they shared for so long. When the vampires each begin to experience deep emotional upheaval
with Elise’s presence, one of them realizes the danger they have placed themselves in.
Thus, the hunt…the turmoil…the need to escape begins.
In the Blood is a pulsing, vividly pictorial novel of emotions offered in the unique
exploration into the lives of vampires. Rick Reed takes away the running theme of past vampire books of mindless creatures
whose sole purpose is to suck the living daylights out of humans, and gives us three distinctive characters with demanding
and powerful personas.
Digging deep into the realm of vampires, a reader will not only be entertained by the ‘chase’ or the ‘hunt’
but the mind game Reed plays on you by offering you a sympathetic backstory into Edward’s ‘human’ existence,
Terence’s fatal mistake, Maria’s stronghold on everyone being questioned, and Elise’s troubled decision.
A great read throughout.
Lea Schizas – Muse Book Reviewer
*GREAT RE
AD
