Vampire hunter Anita Blake has always managed to overcome everything she faces. But this time there’s a monster that even she doesn’t know how to fight…A remote Florida island is the perfect wedding destination for the upcoming nuptials of Anita’s fellow U.S. Marshal and best friend, Edward. For Anita, the vacation is a welcome break, as it’s the first trip she gets to take with just … with just wereleopards Micah and Nathaniel. But it’s not all fun and games and bachelor parties…
In this tropical paradise, Micah discovers a horrific new form of lycanthropy, one that has afflicted a single family for generations. Believed to be the result of an ancient Greek curse, it turns human bodies into a mass of snakes.
When long-simmering resentment leads to a big blow-up within the wedding party, the last thing Anita needs is more drama. But it finds her anyway when women start disappearing from the hotel, and worse, her own friends and lovers are considered the prime suspects. There’s a strange power afoot that Anita has never confronted before, a force that’s rendering those around her helpless. Unable to face it on her own, Anita is willing to accept help from even the deadliest places. Help that she will most certainly regret—if she survives at all, that is…
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I especially like the books with Edward and company., enjoy the hunt for the monsters . By the end I was up at 4am trying to finish, didn’t want to put it down. Involves a twist in Anita’s relationship with Olaf that I found interesting. Thanks to Penguin Random House and Laurell K. Hamilton for the advance copy i won ! I really enjoyed this read !
Well It’s Anita so expect the whiney, angsty disfunction in all of her relationships and the physical descriptions that go on and on and on. At least in this particular book I only have to skip 3 or 4 chapters of blatantly gratuitous explicit group sex. However, the main problem is introduced in a small chapter early on and not taken up again until page 435 of a 485 page book. IE this is a typical book that Ms. Hamilton now writes. I wish that we had the old strong Anita back before she devolved into a weakwilled slut puppy, her I liked.
This book is another great book to have. Anita is facing another hunt but she is to be on vacation with Micah and Nathaniel for Ted’s and Donna’s wedding. When they got to the Key West it was trouble from the beginning. But that is part of being one of Anita Blake’s books. Now is the time to buy it well worth it. Can’t wait for the next one.
I’m not proud of it but sometimes, not always, but sometimes, two characters in a story will come together that just make me shake my head and say no – just no!
Edward and Donna were such a couple for me, mainly because I’m a huge fan of Edward’s and really didn’t think that Donna was near good enough for him.
So it was that when I sat down to read Serpentine I thought that I would going to end up depressed and kind of bitter but as I read along, I began to see what Edward gets and needs from Donna and just how much he loves his family.
So it was that at the end of the book, I just found myself wanting more.
I have loved every single book in this amazing series, have fallen in love and lust with many characters and desperately hope that there will be more, many more stories to come in this delightfully addictive series.
Even after the heroine of the series, Anita Blake, jumped the shark, turned into.a completely different character, and the series went from action packed zombie raising and life or death adventures focusing on Anita’s increasingly orthodox personal relatipnships, I’ve stuck with series writer Laurell K. Hamilton.
Much like a night out drinking with friends knowing you’ll all regret where you wake up and how you got there, Anita has become more slutty trainwreck with the bad ass necromancer/ Vampire Executioner readers cheered for. The books still have moments that remind you of why you signed up for this mess to begin with, but with each new book they become fewer and further in between, and we forget how Anita earned the nickname War. Or whether we even care anymore.
Then Hamilton will throw out a little tease to remind us that the series started out as more than just a way for Hamilton to publicly share her personal fantasies.
Most of this book is that reminder. It feels like while on Anita’s vacation from her new, orgy filled life as “America’s Necromancer Princess” she actually had a chance to do what we used to love watching her do best…helping people, kicking ass, and taking names.
This is the first book in the series in ages that did it’s best to drop the soft core porn and actually allow Anita, Edward, and company to get more done than fret about their sex lives and Anita’s (deserved) shredded reputation and get the job done. It wasn’t a total throwback, but loyal readers are used to rolling their eyes every other page by now. However, the less frequent necessary eye rolling was lovely.
This book I might actually be able to defend to the friends of mine that bailed so many books ago. I, for one, have never been able to look away from a train wreck. So no matter how ridiculous the series gets, I’ll always shell out whatever it costs to see what Hamillton has set on fire this time. I just can’t help myself.
As always I fall in love with Anita Blake’s obtuseness.
See my review on Goodreads
I have read all of the books in this series plus the Merry. Seried.
If you like Hamilton’s Anita Blake books, but shy away from all the eroticism they usually contain, a good rule of thumb is to seek out the books where Anita teams up with Edward, her fellow US Marshall and a man she will not sleep with under any circumstances. There’s still going to be sex between Anita and her various guys, but the lack of romantic chemistry between her and Edward (not to mention fellow marshalls Bernardo and the oh-so-creepy Olaf) creates a narrative in which a four-chapter-long group sex marathon is not nearly as likely as it might usually be. In this book, Edward is at long last getting married, and if you think that’s going to go smoothly, then you are obviously new. I enjoyed it and if you’re an Urban Fantasy fan and not a prude, you will too.
Waaay too much relationship drama. Made me claustrophobic just reading about it. I used to love this series, but it’s all just too emo for me now.
Part of a series, so the story continues-not one of my favorites, however.
Interesting story developed by the end. Although there is some repetition about who is who, overall an entertaining tale of supernatural who-dunnit. Better than some of the author’s latest books.
Serpentine by Laurell K. Hamilton is a supernatural romantic suspense story with some domestic drama added for spice. It is the twenty-sixth book in Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series. This time, the main setting is in the Florida Keys where Anita’s friend and colleague U.S. Marshal Ted Forrester is set to marry his long-time love, Donna. This is supposed to be a vacation for Anita, Micah, and Nathaniel. However things don’t go to plan. Between a new form of lycanthropy, resentment among the wedding party members and missing women, this is anything but a relaxing vacation.
This book focuses on relationships for a large part of the book. Whether it is Anita’s relationships with the many men and women in her life, the relationships among the bridal party members, or friends growing apart over time; there is a lot of domestic drama. The last 25 percent of the book has the more traditional action that many expect from this series. I felt this was a welcome change. It shows how Anita and those in her life are struggling to make enough time in their lives to balance work and personal relationships. This actually made her feel more relatable.
There are some very steamy scenes full of joy, playfulness, and shared humor. But there are also violent, horrible scenes, interspecies disputes, grief, hurt feelings, desperation, revenge, love, magic, abductions, and much more.
Overall, this book was a study of complicated relationships until the last 35 – forty percent or so when it became a lot more suspenseful, action-oriented, and fast-paced.
I have read all of the books in this series up to this point and can’t wait to start the next one. They are best read in order as there is a lot of background and character development that builds over time. She brings great characters, entertaining story lines, action and romance together in her novels.
I own a digital copy of this novel. This is my honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own and are not biased in any way.
I always enjoy books about Anita and this is one I was excited about because of the wedding.
I really like Laurell’s books but this one was a little tamer than usual. Good storyline though. (Just not as up to par this time)
Blake is back and the long awaited wedding between assassin Edward and his hippy fiancé Donna is finally happening (it’s been 18 books in the making) and Hamilton has found the perfect venue to mix the supernatural mysteries she built the series on with her love of complicated relationships making this one of the best books in the series in a very long time.
The wedding is held at a resort in Florida and from minute one there is trouble in paradise. Anita brings two of her lovers (Micah and Nathaniel) with her and Nathaniel is showing how much he has grown in the past 20+ books by throwing a little tantrum over the fact that Micah and Anita can’t let go of work for a day to enjoy the promised vacation. He responds by flirting with a lot of women and that, unfortunately, gets him into trouble when one of those women disappears.
At the same time, Donna’s relationship with Edward is being messed up by one of her bride’s maids who can’t let go of her certainty that Edward is having an affair with Anita behind Donna’s back. She is determined to stop the wedding as proof of her friendship with Donna—and Hamilton pulls off this kind of crazy idea extremely well. And let’s face it, Edward’s whole real life is a secret so there is plenty of covering up going on anyway. It adds some really wonderful distracting tension as the police focus on Nathaniel as their main suspect in the woman’s disappearance.
Then there is the supernatural problem running side-by-side the wedding woes and Nathaniel’s two crises—a new form of lycanthropy (or possibly just a shape shifting curse) has come to light and it really is horrific. People might enjoy fantasizing about what it would be like to turn into a wolf or leopard, but no one would want to suffer through this. As a reader, you know all of this is going to tie together somehow, but I didn’t figure out how Hamilton was going to accomplish this.
My only real complaint about the story is there are nine or so chapters in the beginning which could have been totally cut out. I realize that Hamilton wants to keep tabs on what’s happening with Jean Claude and the rest of the extremely large cast, but I didn’t think these chapters added any genuine substance.
This book was very entertaining. I guess I’d call it light horror. The characters were interesting and there was enough that wasn’t predictable that it was able to keep one’s attention.
Anita Blake just can’t get away from the monsters. They seem to follow her everywhere-even to her best friend’s wedding. Great story line, and she brought my favorite character into the mix. Definitely need to add this to your to be read pile.
and this series. I have most of this series in paperback. Getting ebooks when on sale. Laurell is another of my favorite authors. Can’t wait for the next book. Wish there was a new Merry book coming.
Latest in the long series about Anita Blake. As always, highly enjoyable and will keep you turning pages. An unexpected happy ending for a friend and another dark creature to defeat. Ending is always somewhat unexpected.