Review pt. 3: Holidays are Hell - Marjorie M. Liu

Book Description: There's no place like home for the horrordays—unless you'd prefer a romantic midnight walk through a ghost-infested graveyard . . . or a haunted house candlelight dinner with the sexy vampire of your dreams. The (black) magical season is here—and whether it's a solstice séance gone demonically wrong with the incomparable Kim Harrison, a grossly misshapen Christmas with the remarkable Lynsay Sands, a blood-chilling-and-spilling New Year's with the wonderful Marjorie M. Liu, or a super-powered Thanksgiving with the phenomenal Vicki Pettersson, one thing is for certain: in the able hands of these exceptional dark side explorers, the holidays are going to be deliciously hellish!

My contribution to the anthology is called Six, and is set in Shanghai during Chinese New Year. Six is one of the deadliest women in China.  Trained from birth to be a warrior, a soldier for the secret police, she can handle anything, anyone.  Except for one man.  The only person who can save her soul.  If she can keep him alive.  -Marjorie M. Liu

Review:
Marjorie M. Liu's Six gives us in interesting eastern spin on vampires and necromancers during the Chinese New Year celebration. The story shifts back and forth from the perspective of Six, a Chinese government raised agent, and Joseph, a necromancer who helps Six when she is infected by a vampire.  When Six meets Joseph she has difficulty accepting the existence of the paranormal world and initially thinks he’s a terrorist, but she can’t deny what she sees and eventually agrees to help Joseph track down the terrorist cell of vampires. 

The world building was very strong here and the take on vampires as feeders of not blood but human souls was unique.  The real problem I had with this story with the character of Six.  She’s extremely distrustful and almost robotic in her behavior that I had difficulty accepting the life changing choices she made, specifically her romantic relationship with Joseph. I did not see them developing in that direction, and when they abruptly did, if felt false given Six’s detachment up until that point.

Sexual Content:
One or two (depending on how you look at it) graphic sex scenes

Click HERE to read an excerpt of "Six".

*Note* Six is part of the Holidays are Hell anthology.

---

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Harper (October 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061239097
• ISBN-13: 978-0061239090