Anita Blake and her vampire lover receive a too early visit from the representative of the vampire that made Jean-Claude who only wishes to bring him and his back into her fold, or so it seems. But her designs on Jean-Claude and all that is his is only a smokescreen for a deeper desire. While Anita must do what she can to protect the people she cares about, she's finds herself embroiled in a conflict over her newfound sexuality with Dolph, the head of the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team of the police, while trying to solve several grisly murders by men who may have made her a target.
Impression: While not nearly as bad as the previous 4 novels, Cerulean Sins still fails to capture the excitement and jazz of the first 3 or 4 novels. Perhaps I just didn't expect as much with this novel and so it didn't seem as bad, but the book also managed to make me less inclined to give the series up. this was my make or break it novel. Granted, I won't rush out and buy anymore Anita Blake (and I gave up on Princess Merry with the first novel), but I won't mind adding her to the library and reading list either. The book did hold my attention and I did read through it in 2 or 3 days, so that does mean something, even if it wasn't as impressive as the earlier books in the series.
One of my biggest problems with Sins was how the detective aspect of the novel got buried under other plotlines. A vampire hunter detective was a real novelty when I first started reading Anita Blake. It was cool! But this aspect of the Anita Blake series seemed merely tossed in here and there rather than an integral part of the book. It really could have been yanked out of the novel entirely without doing any damage to the story/novel, that's how unimportant it was. I understand that characters change, but this wasn't just a character change, this was a complete refocusing of the series, and not one I liked since it reduces what I buy the series for down to nothing.
However, at least Anita's whininess from the previous few books is gone. She's no longer torn between her two lovers and seems to have accepted her sexuality to some degree. And that sexuality didn't take over the book as it has done in the past.
Final words: Cerulean Sins is okay. Not great, but not as badly written as the previous 3 or 4 novels either. It doesn't quite live up to the dramatic blurb on the inside cover, but it's not a total disappointment either.
