Reviewed by Vicki

TITLE: Dare to Love Forever 

SERIES: New Vampire Justice #1

AUTHOR: Jake C. Wallace

PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press

LENGTH: 260 pages

RELEASE DATE: September 26th, 2016

BLURB:

2nd Edition
New Vampire Justice: Book One

With pain and loss in their pasts and evil threatening their futures, two vampires will find a love that lasts forever… if they dare.

Carson Locke is dangerous, even by vampire standards. A rare Tabula Rasa vampire, he can wipe the mind of those he bites—human or vampire. Because of this, he’s lived his entire life in isolation. When his family is murdered, Carson runs from those who want him dead. Injured, starving, and about to be executed, he meets Commander Lincoln Samuels, an officer in the New Vampire Justice police force.

Lincoln, a Sanatore vampire, possesses the gift of healing. The moment he encounters Carson, broken and terrified, trying to steal blood to survive, he is compelled to help the other man—despite the risk to himself. Their bond creates something the world has never seen, but others have plans for Carson and his destiny was written long before he was born. He’ll either become a tool to control the vampire world or, with Lincoln by his side, find the courage to fight and become its savior.

First Edition published by Amber Allure, 2014.

REVIEW:

Damn! That is some serious world-building! I am a big fan of vampire books, and this is one of the best I’ve read in a long time.

This is a whole new take on the vampire myths, and I loved it! Here are some of the details: Vampires in this world aren’t super strong, can’t heal instantly, aren’t immortal, can go out in the sun, eat regular food… basically they are humans that need a bit of blood to survive. They can survive just fine on synthetic blood, but there are places to go to bite humans. They are part of society, but are very much discriminated against. There are two police forces, one for humans, one for vampires. There are a few “classes” of vampires, some more common, some more rare. Carson is a Tabula Rasa vampire, the rarest of the rare. He’s been raised by his mother and uncle, with his brother, but kept away from everyone. It’s too risky to let him be around others, in case someone figures out what he is, and forces him to bite people and wipe their minds. The other main character is Lincoln, a Sanatore vampire, who can do a bit of healing. Lincoln is a cop on the NVJ force, the police department for vampires.

So the story starts with Carson breaking in to a blood bank for vampires, and getting caught by the NVJ. He’s nearly executed on the spot by an asshole cop, but is saved by Lincoln. Lincoln realizes Carson is just trying to survive, and that something is going on with him, and takes him back to the NVJ headquarters to get some much needed help. This gets the two of our heroes together and starts a crazy story! It seems simple at first, Carson’s family has been killed, and Lincoln is working on finding out what happened. But things with Carson get weird on a physical level, something is happening with his body that no one has seen before. So there is some scrambling and panicking to help him. Then we start to see there is much more going on to this story… There are good guy, bad guys, guys who seem good but aren’t, guys who seem bad but aren’t. It was all crazy, and very well plotted!

There is lots of drama, several times I wasn’t sure how Carson and Lincoln were going to get out of the mess they were in. There are some nice sex scenes between them, and I loved that the obvious roles were reversed. There was enough sex to give them a strong physical and emotional bond, but not so much that it distracted from the story. Each of these men have issues, Lincoln seems so big and strong but he’s had his heart broken and is just going through the motions of life. He needs someone to care for, and to learn to love and trust again. Carson has been cared for his whole life, and is a mess when the two get together. We really focus on what is happening to him on a paranormal (for lack of a better word…) level, but he’s also had his heart broken and needs to find love as well. They are really perfect for each other.

I loved the side characters too, Doc, Max, Justin, Tommy, all added to the ensemble feeling of the book. Yes, it was Carson and Lincoln’s story, but they wouldn’t have been able to do what they did without help. The story was quite interesting, I was totally hooked and stayed up until midnight two nights in a row to see what happened! I loved the complexity of the world the author created, and I loved that the vampires were so much more human than is usual in these type of books. This was a really good balance between the romance between Lincoln and Carson, (the emotional romance, not the hearts and flowers kind) and a well executed dramatic plot. It was a bit of insta-love, but once you get farther in the story you learn why, and it worked for me. I’m hooked on this world and I want more!

I have seen this book around for the last couple of years, but honestly the old cover didn’t catch my attention, so I skipped over it. I was curious about it after seeing the book on our list to review, and thought I’d try a new to me author. I am very happy I did! The writing was very good, the plot, details, characters, history, sex, drama, all kept me very entertained. If you are a fan of vampires, I’d give this one a try. It was a very unique book and I loved it!

I can’t wait for the next book in this series!

RATING: 

BUY LINKS:

Dreamspinner Press

Amazon

ARe