Viper Moon (Earth Witches, #1) in Vampires, Weres and Fae!

Aug 18, 2011 Melindeeloo rated it really liked it

Shelves: urban-fantasy, paranormal-romance, xpif-sonja-2019

3.5 stars - From the cover, I was expecting Viper Moon to be an urban fantasy read, and the first person narrative by a kick-butty heroine along with cursed Barrows region of her southern city setting - which gives a whole new life to urban blight - certainly starts the story off in that camp. However, when all was said and done, Viper Moon ended up being one of those new hybrids that straddle the line between urban fantasy and paranormal romance. Viper Moon has more romance than your standard U 3.5 stars - From the cover, I was expecting Viper Moon to be an urban fantasy read, and the first person narrative by a kick-butty heroine along with cursed Barrows region of her southern city setting - which gives a whole new life to urban blight - certainly starts the story off in that camp. However, when all was said and done, Viper Moon ended up being one of those new hybrids that straddle the line between urban fantasy and paranormal romance. Viper Moon has more romance than your standard UF including what looks to be a complete wrap-up of the heroine's story at the end, but is more focused on story than rather than deep relationship development than your typical paranormal romance - I guess that makes it UFR:) So, the bottom line is that romance readers who like urban fantasy too are probably going to enjoy Viper Moon more than straight urban fantasy fans will.

For me, I enjoyed Viper Moon. I liked the heroine Cassandra Archer who is a servant to the Earth Mother, dedicated to finding lost children, especially those who fall prey to the darker elements of the supernaturally blighted area of the Barrows - a place where monsters, both human and 'not', reside - a place that the typical resident of Duviel Misssouri can't even perceive. I also really liked police detective Flynn who is forced to turn to Cass for help in finding his lost sister when his conventional investigation techniques fail to turn up any clues, and I was really intrigued by the angelic Michael, who may be something more than human, and who has both feet planted firmly in the Barrows. As a romance reader I found both of the men appealing, but I was rooting more for Flynn, because I thought that the inherent conflict between Flynn and Cass was more interesting - he's a black and white cop grounded in the 'real' world and Cass lives her life in shades of gray and is willing to venture into the black occasionally to get the job done, so it's more of a challenge to imagine how that's going to work long term.

I also liked pretty much all of the characters around Cass, her healer/seer mentor Abby, a crime boss who also needs help finding his lost son, and Cass' furred and scaled animal companions. On the whole this was a decent series starter and the world - and the characters whose story lines are still in play - have a lot of potential. Viper Moon didn't end up being quite what I expected, since there is apparently another of the Earth Mother's chosen ones in the lead in the next book and not Cass, but it was still a promising start to Roland's not-so-witchy Earth Witch series. ...more

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