I hope that anybody that has read my blog may have noticed that I do love a vampire story, so I wasn't going to say no to being part of the blog tour for May Day by Josie Jaffrey.
The first thing I picked up on was this was probably a bit more 'grown up' than some of the vampire books I have read in the past, it also turned a lot of my vampire ideas on their head. For instance, vampires in this tale are known as Silver, they all walk in the daylight with no magic rings, spells or curses involved, they do not prey on humans for their blood and they love a bottle of gin (who doesn't)? An interesting start...
The book follows lead character Jack Valentine, a young vampire who is also a Seeker, probably best described as the vampire society's own police force. It's safe to say, Jack is a mess, she's hard work and in real life terms, she would be the mate you would constantly be apologising for on a night out. Based in Oxford, Jack and the rest of her Seeker team are tasked with investigating the murder of a human by a vampire. With so many clues and no solid evidence the investigation has many loose ends to tie up, what was the motive? Was it money or something else? Just how much did the human know about the Silver world? And could the higher forces of the Silver world be tangled up in it somehow?
Being open and honest, I did struggle at the start of the book, I found Jack particularly frustrating, but I am so glad I stuck with it. The story was well planned and the murder investigation takes you in lots of different directions - I was expecting a different outcome. For a vampire story, the actual fact the main characters were vampires seemed secondary to what was actually going on. This was more about a character growing, figuring out who she is and what she wants whilst solving an almost impossible crime with a lot of shady people involved.
We also have a love triangle thrown in for good measure, asking that age old question - do you go with the safe option, or the dangerous, exciting one?
All in all, after a slightly rocky start, I very much enjoyed this. I enjoyed the writing, the frantic, all over the place actions of Jack are evident in the pages and the fact that I did find her frustrating is a credit to the author and how well written the character is. This was a solid start for a new book series and I'm interested to see how the rest of the series pans out.
Thank you again to the WriteReads for giving me a spot on the tour.
I received this as an e-book in return for an honest review as part of The Write Reads Ultimate Blog Tour.