From the Shadows I Review: *** Review*** Depraved Blood (The Young Bloodsuckers #1) by P.J. Dominicis

This first entry in “The Young Bloodsuckers Series” is the story of three desperate, lost souls—a teenage brother and sister and a man on the verge of a breakdown—whose lives are forever changed by two ancient yet boyish vampires, one good and the other evil. Raw, dark and moody, told with an unabashed, mature voice that breaks through the insipid twilight with taboo depravity.

I’m choosing this because:

I didn’t actually choose this. It makes this section of my review slightly awkward. This was sent to me by the author. I want to point out that the author didn’t ask me if I’d read the book, they just sent it to me and due to me being a nice person I feel obliged to read it. Would I have read this given the choice? I don’t think so. The synopsis doesn’t sound like what I’d read normally. The way it was described to me also didn’t make me think “Ooh! I need to read this!” either. I’m literally only reading this out of obligation.

Judging a book by its cover:

It creeps the hell out of me. I’m not just saying that, it does. It’s not a cover I’d go for and you all know how I feel about covers. If I lust after a cover I gravitate towards a book and this just doesn’t do it for me. The eye freaks me out and the nose looks weird and I just don’t like it. Okay, the more I look at it, the more I don’t like it and I just don’t know why. Not even the font makes me excited and that is bad! We all know how much I like fonts...

Pricing the (possible) awesomeness:

So there’s a paperback version and an eBook edition available on Amazon. The paperback is £8.97 (quite expensive for a paperback, but oh well, indies need to charge more.) and the Kindle edition is £1.99. Big price difference, if I’d bought it I’d have gone for the Kindle edition. I’m a cheapskate. Of course my edition was free, courtesy of the author.

I hate myself for every word that I’m going to type because I know they could’ve been avoided. This book was not for me. I had a feeling when I read the synopsis but I decided to give it a go anyway. I left my reservations at the door, grabbed my Kindle and read. The problem is, I saw this compared to ‘Lost Souls’ by ‘Poppy Z. Brite’ and I wasn’t feeling that book either so I’m not even sure how I ended up with this. However, I read every page and now I want to tell you why I didn’t like this book. This is probably going to get ranty because I got offended and it takes a lot to offend me.

Let’s start with my biggest issue: Half of these characters were turned into vampires as children/teenagers... and they’re having sex. I don’t care have many years have passed it’s perverted. The idea turned my stomach, half the things they were doing I don’t want to think of an adult doing... let alone a young, impressionable child. I’m sorry I cannot get some of these images out of my head and they make me want to curl up in my bed and WEEP. If I started I probably wouldn’t STOP. I just feel repulsed!! In fact, I think there’s 1 character in this book that is technically legal in the US.

The bathroom scene: It’s about 35% into the book. I almost DNFed this RIGHT THERE. It was TOO much. There was too much HATE, too much VIOLENCE. It was TOO GRAPHIC FULL STOP. If I’d eaten I would’ve been saying hello to my stomach contents. I’m not saying that scenes like that shouldn’t exist, I’m saying they need to be written in a way that doesn’t make your poor reader want to VOMIT. It was OVER THE TOP. It broke my heart, and if I hadn’t wept enough for the CHILDREN, I would’ve WEPT SOME MORE.

There’s a phrase, let me get my quote on, “She then felt his throbbing tongue raping her lips” - What on EARTH? Do I have to actually have to explain what’s wrong with THIS??? DO YOU KNOW WHAT RAPE MEANS? WHAT IT DOES? HOW IT DAMAGES THE VICTIM? I want to bang my head against a brick wall REPEATEDLY. Even if that isn’t enough *SPOILER WARNING* SHE WAS WILLING!!! SHE WANTED HIM!! THEREFORE IT CANNOT BE RAPE!!

Right, I’m nice and wound up in the sense that recalling these things is making me CRY. We’ve hit NERVES, RAW NERVES. So what I’m going to do is move on, I’ll continue this like I normally would so 3 character break downs coming up:

Constantinos – Our, young, evil vampire. I can’t stand him. So twisted and corrupted and beyond redemption. I couldn’t relate to him, he was so out of touch and so unwilling to see others point of view. He’s one of the most unlikable characters I’ve EVER COME ACROSS. And we all know how I feel about some characters and their pathetic/just plain awfulness.

Janis – Aaaah... she’s one of those who sees a vampire and instantly decides she’s in love with them. They annoy me, I’m not saying there’s no such thing as love at first sight, I’m saying that it’s ridiculous to act like a slapper the second a guy looks at you in a slightly sexual manner. Other than that she seemed to be slightly normal, but lovesick puppy without a brain was definitely present. Also she didn’t act the way most people would when bad stuff happened to her, that never fails to get my goat.

Jeremy – He’s very woe is me and to a point I can relate, but then he goes out there and he makes that sympathy erase itself as he goes from someone who deserves it to someone manipulated by Constantinos and unable to see the evil sod for what he is.

Overall I feel the author’s writing style has potential, they aren’t a bad writer, it’s that what they’ve written isn’t for me. Although towards the end of this the editing got increasingly sloppy and mistakes littered the final few chapters. The things that bother me are probably issues more personal to myself. The thing is, I couldn’t like this because I’d feel like a traitor to everything I stand for. The M/M stuff is fine, the violence (if that’s your bag) is fine. But the rape, the really, incredibly stupid phrase I pulled up, the age the characters are or were turned into vampires, they are NOT okay to me. They are SO FAR FROM OKAY. I hurt inside when I read this, I wanted to be sick, I wanted to cry but I saw through my duty as a reviewer and I read this. It just wasn’t for me.

1 Star – If you’ve read through my review then you know exactly why I didn’t like this. If you’re one of the people close to me, you’ll know exactly why I CAN’T give this more than 1 star. I won’t reiterate my reasons again. They’re in my review in black and white. Just know I loathed this and I won’t read any more of this series.