Published: April 25, 2013
Genre: Paranormal Mystery YA
Format: Kindle
Source: sent for review as part of a blog tour
Ghosts, a reaper, and a rock star.
At sixteen Bay-Lee is not your typical girl. She doesn't even try to fit in at school. What's the point when she'll be moving to a new place within a few months?
She's lived her whole life on the run, hiding from monsters.
Then a reaper uses her closet to cross over from the Spirit Realm. It has a message for her. Just when she's about to join her father at his school for hunters she finds out they are dying on their birthdays. Something is killing them, slipping past locked doors, never leaving a trace of evidence, and her birthday is only two months away.
Becoming a hunter isn't exactly her dream come true. She's doing it for her mother, for revenge, for justice. Nothing is going to get in her way, least of all love. Then she looks up into a pair of jungle green eyes and everything changes.
Bait is also available in ebook form from all the usual suspects in online retailers.
“I break into the homes of random girls all the time… just to talk. Being a rock star doesn't keep me busy enough.”
This book follows 16 year old Bay-Lee. Most of her life she has been moving around, changing identities, and flying under the radar with her Uncle Conner. Since she is Van Halsing's daughter, she has to live a life of hiding from the Order and other monsters. Her life takes an odd turn when she is visited one night by 2 different people. One being the spirit of Tyler Beck, the heart throb from the famous group Bad Rock. He swears she ruined his life, even though she has never met the man before. The other creature is a reaper with an ominous message about her death. She soon finds herself in her father’s academy learning the ways of a hunter. She is now faced with trying to figure out who Bay-Lee is after years of pretending to be someone else. She also seems to stumble into a forbidden love. Bay-Lee soon sees the reaper's warnings coming true of many hunters dying on their birthday. Her new mission is to figure out what and who is behind these murders, and stop them before they kill her and the boy she loves.
This was a very good and interesting book to me. It is set in a world where there are vampires, werewolves, spirits of all kinds, mermaids, and reapers. Most of these creatures are talked about and mentioned but aren’t really a big part of this story. In this book the main protagonist is actually from the spirit category. Not much action with the others in this book. I did absolutely love and adore this book though. Bay-Lee is a very strong lead. I fell in love with her character from the first page. She is very multi-dimensional, she has a fun spunky attitude, a little hard-headed, and she reminds me a lot of me. I love a character with so many layers. Then there’s Tyler Beck, the rock God. He is everything a heart throb should be. When Bay-Lee first encounters him he is a jerk who swears she is the sole reason his whole life has been ruined. Part of the fun of this book is trying to figure out why he has such hatred for poor Bay-Lee. The big mystery in the book is why hunters keep dying on their birthdays. And it just gets better from there. I don’t want to say too much about it because when you read it, I want every surprise and twist and turn to hit you in the face like it did me.
Well there’s Van Halsing he’s the greatest legend around:
What did I love about this book? The better question is what didn’t I love? The characters were well fleshed out, the story line was well thought out and executed. With so many different directions you can go in a setting with so many creatures, it would be easy to over complicate a story. The author did a great job at balancing the story. I personally fell in love with the characters from the beginning. A good book comes from a good story and characters you can love. I adored Bay-Lee. I haven’t talked much about her father yet. Van Halsing is one of those characters that the people in the book are almost afraid of because of his power and his great skills. But you get to see a vulnerable side when it comes to his daughter it is very sweet. It feels like an authentic strained father/daughter relationship. Something a lot of people can relate to. The main plot of course is about the hunters dying on their birthday. With every new twist and turn, it had my mind going 90 to nothing. I don’t want to go into detail about any of the story because it is just that good and I want everything to surprise you like it did me. The subplot centers around a forbidden love and a prophecy of a doomed world. This mystery also had me wanting to know more. It had my full attention. The other thing I ABSOLUTELY LOVED was the fact at the end of the book I was taken totally by surprised. One of those surely I did not read what I thought I read moments. When a book does something totally unexpected it makes me all warm and tingly inside.
There is no such thing as a good Border Monster:
I can’t really say there was much about this book I didn’t like. The only thing I would say was kind of a letdown was I pegged the killer early on. In all fairness I have read so many books I am pretty good at that. It’s not often I can say I didn’t see the killer coming. Even with that, not a big complaint. I still loved the book!
Conclusion: I would love to be a Van Halsing
This is a great book, with a great foundation for a series. I think no matter what genre you prefer you would like this book. It is well written and easy to follow. The story and the characters are all wonderful. I highly recommend. I will be reading the 2nd book without a doubt!!
“I thought this was every teen girl’s fantasy to have me in her bedroom. Was I wrong?”
Author K.C. Blake
Born and raised in California, I fell in love with writing while reading The Outsiders. Then I fell in love with Stephen King's writing style. I enjoy reading many types of books, but YA Paranormal is my favorite. I used to write for Harlequin under a different name. So that's my background. Exciting, no?
Sucks that this post disappeared. That's not fun at all. I am so happy you enjoyed this book but for some reason, it just isn't catching my attention. Not sure why.
ReplyDeleteI haven't heard of this book, but I love the cover and the blurb even more. Great review, Melody. I just added it to my TBR shelf. I like that you related to the MC and that there is everything from vamps to mermaids. I'm glad you were able to recover from the post disappearing. Better late than never is right. Happy Friday!
ReplyDeletethe fleshed out characters and well done story line sounds great!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you loved this book, Melody! I hope I love it as much. :)
ReplyDelete