A small-town baker uses her magic to confront a post–vampire apocalypse world in this award-winning fantasy Neil Gaiman called “pretty much perfect.” Although it had been mostly deserted since the Voodoo Wars, there hadn’t been any trouble out at the lake for years. Rae Seddon, nicknamed Sunshine, head baker at her family’s busy and popular café in downtown New Arcadia, needed a place to get away … place to get away from all the noise and confusion—of the clientele and her family. Just for a few hours. Just to be able to hear herself think.
She knew about the Others, of course. Everyone did. And several of her family’s best regular customers were from SOF—Special Other Forces—which had been created to deal with the threat and the danger of the Others.
She drove out to her family’s old lakeside cabin and sat on the porch, swinging her feet and enjoying the silence and the silver moonlight on the water.
She never heard them coming. Of course, you don’t when they’re vampires.
Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sookie Stackhouse will cheer for this tough and quirky heroine. In Sunshine, which won the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature, McKinley has a vampire novel that is “a smart, funny tale of suspense and romance” (San Francisco Chronicle).
more
This isn’t your run-of-the-mill vampire novel. It does not take place in the “real world”. This is a world that has always had supernatural beings amongst the humans. A world where the Voodoo Wars devastated much of the globe about 15 years before our story begins.
The title character, Sunshine, works in her family’s coffee house as a baker. One night she decides to take a drive and is captured by vampires. Complications ensue. She finds strength from her grandmother’s teachings on how to handle magic and, despite many trials, rises against an evil master vampire.
There are a few sex scenes. Being an alternative world, the swear words are mostly not those people will object too. I love the language, which contributes to the world building. Spartan is good, Carthaginian is bad. When she was a teenager Sunshine aspired to be “stark Spartan”.
I have listened to the Audible book, read by Laurel Merlington, over 300 times. It continues to be my comfort book in times of trial. Sunshine is a spoonie though much of the book, overcoming her illness and fatigue to yet do great things.
Now this is the type of vampire-genre book that will keep you interested in wanting more.
As a school librarian, I have read several of Robin McKinley’s award winning children’s novels and enjoyed them immensely. This is the first of her adult novels that I have read and it was amazing. Sunshine speaks out in her own voice and seems like such a normal person. Then her life is upended by her capture by vampires and even more so as her magic abilities emerge in a great spurt of power. The power she uses to save her fellow captive who is a vampire. Suddenly she has inherited magic from her biological father whom she has not seen in years and thanks to a little training from her maternal grandmother begins to control it. Her disappearance did not go unnoticed nor did her changed demeanor. Her secrets keep multiplying – knowing a vampire, having more magic, working with the SOR who protect humans against vampires and other abnormal beings. Whew!! This was a great read.
I happen to love Robin McKinley. I have ever since my sister convinced me to read the Blue Sword back in high school (fyi she was literally the last one to check out all the fantasy books before me, and yes we still used paper check out cards when I was in high school although we had switched to a digital card catalog, wahoo!). I have read almost all of her books. I love fairy tale retells, probably why I like Robin McKinley so much. Sunshine is nothing like any of her other works. It technically could be a Beauty and the Beast retell, but if that’s what you’re looking for go to Beauty (her first) or Rosedaughter (a later work) for that story (both are great and tell the tale very differently). Sunshine is a vampire novel, but it is one of the few that doesn’t glorify vampires. They’re villains (for the most part) and Rae (or Sunshine) has to come to grips with the fact that she befriends a vampire (Con still has to eat people but he isn’t entirely evil, as he says ‘there are different ways of being’ and his way has advantages). I wish we found out more about Mel (Rae’s boyfriend), he’s amazing and I want to know his backstory. I loved the fact that Rae is a reluctant heroine. She tells us flat out she isn’t brave, but can be a b*$ch. Much of the novel is her reflections and I find her thought process fascinating (some reviewers say these bits drag on and on, but I thought her inner dialog was enjoyable). If you have a chance to listen to the audiobook, it’s great. It’s like listening to a friend relate her life story of crazy adventures.
Overall I really enjoy Sunshine. It’s nothing like any other Robin McKinley book, it’s gritty and dark and raw (the only McKinley works I could compare would be Deerskin and Chalice). Rae feels real, like really real. She’s just a baker who has basically forgotten that her dad was most likely a sorcerer and her gran taught her some stuff when she was a kid. She didn’t ask for anything unusual to happen in her life, and she fully expects to die at almost every turn. She has to buck up and do the hard things, the really hard things, even when she wants to hide under the covers and she does (expecting to die of course). This is one that if you’re squeamish, you might want to skip (amp up the Deerskin throne scene by about 1000, there are literally exploding vampires in this) the descriptions are so well written you visualize what’s happening (even if you might prefer not to).
Ultimately this is on my go back to, read the best parts shelf. I’ve read it full through several times, listened to the audio several more, and skimmed best parts as well.
I’m torn between 3 and 4 stars, but only because of personal preference so I’m going with 4.
I’ve read so many books over the years, and so few have stuck with me. This one did.
I love this book!
What is not to love from Robin McKinley? I had all of her books until I moved to Belfair. For some reason the Fates always steal one box of stuff when I move. They chose the box with all my favorites! Hope they’re happliy entertaining themselves with my books.
Absolutely original stand out breaks all the molds reading. Nothing is stereotypical, the characters are so real I could smell the baking. Keeper shelf material. All the feels, absolutely agonized for the characters. Don’t start this when you think you might be interrupted. You won’t want to stop. I went back for the audio when it came out. One click author for me now.
THIS IS MY PERSONAL REVIEW BASED ON MY EXPERIENCE READING 100% MY OPINION
Ok now that that’s out of the way… to start off the book immediately bored me to death. Within the first couple pages I was done. For some reason I told myself to hang on because it could get better. During most of chapters (?) I rolled my eyes and was confused because the author literally just throws useless information for hours until you realize it has nothing to do with the main story. So much explanations but you could barely picture yourself in the story. This book has so much useless rambling that it took me a while to focus. At one point I stopped caring about any of it making any sense and was so overwhelmed by nonsense I skipped pages. Overall to me this was a random, boring, and definitely did not keep me interest. Unfortunately I wasnt able to finish it because It was too much.
Constantine was a pretty cool character though. He wasn’t the normal Edward Cullen type of vampire. He was completely different and I respect that!
I first read this book in 2004 and have revisited it several times since. It remains my favorite book. To my mind it’s simply perfect, and I have always hoped to learn more of the story of these memorable characters. If you loan it to a friend, no spoilers please! Its always best if they don’t hear the vampires coming….
Pretty good take on a classic story. Too bad there’s not a follow up
I like the story lines. A Vampire who doesn’t follow the rules and helps destroy other vampires. A baker who rescues a vampire. Neat. Lost my copy,have to get a new copy. Well worth it.
If you don’t mind a wandering timeline, this book is worth a read.
I enjoyed reading this story, although I seldom read vampire stories. It was unlike other books. The lead character was charming. The premise of the story was unusual.
Like this author would like a part 2
The story itself was a great idea. The book itself was not for me, due to the writing style and the lack of closure and lack of a happily ever after ending. The writer in my opinion rambled on and on about pointless things. I ended up skipping numerous parts. I am a read a whole book in a sitting type of person and I actually fell asleep! She introduced lots of characters in the first few chapters that I took note of thinking they would be important later on but a few was just mentioned that one time. There was this sense of almost romance between the main characters but then it never developed. Like i said the book fell flat on the ending. It was almost like the author rambled and rambled and then when the story could actually used some closure and actually could have developed more between the two main characters she seemed to realize the book was just too long and stop. It could also be a set up for a sequel. Also her writing style was not cohesive either, there was times she was talking about coitus and then another the same character was full on dirty. I don’t believe a book has to have sex to make it great I can complete be alluded to intimacy and be just happy but this didnt even have hardly a hand shake. I personally would not recommend reading this book, but the story itself was great and if it is ever edited and republished I would give it another shot.
What a great book! Not you “usual” vampire book. Can’t wait for the next one.
It wasn’t a bad book, it just wasn’t quite what I thought it would be
One of my all-time favorites