After hearing so much about this series and the TV show it spawned (True Blood), I figured it was time for me to read the first book in the series. My verdict: ehhh, not so great. Sookie is a waitress in Louisiana with the ability to read minds. One day, a vampire (they're public knowledge) comes into the bar where she works, they fall in love, and then a string of murders happens in the area that everyone is intent on solving, trying to figure out its link to vampires.

The plot was okay, but the book overall was boring. The writing was extremely poor, the characters not particularly likable, the romance was completely flat, and I was only mildly interested in finding out the killer's identity by the end. The ability to read minds is cool... but even that was boring the way it was described! On a related note, it was a big stretch to believe that the reason Sookie didn't figure out the killer's identity sooner is because she hadn't properly read the killer's mind. Uhh.. what? The characters had little to no depth, excitement never once leapt off the page, and the writing was so lackluster that it continually made me want to skim. Also, the way certain scenes were written, it made me wonder how old the author was, simply because SUCH old fashioned terms or phrases were used.

I'm not really sure why this series has such a following. While this wasn't the worst book I've ever read, it was definitely not something I'd ever recommend.