Dead Until Dark

So... this is a story of an unusual girl who falls in love with an unusual boy. And other unusual boys also fall for her, because she's SPECIAL. And people get murdered. They solve the murders. But - I don't think they'll live happily ever after, because issues.

Pretty basic paranormal romance, nothing special. If you like paranormal romance, and are normal, you'll like these books. I'm not normal, and her reactions and reasoning are baffling to me.

What did I like about it? Er... Sam. I like Sam. (Bonus points for her saving herself.)

What I didn't like about it?

I think Sookie is a bitch. A whiny, self-centered, conceited bitch, and I don't like her.

I am really put off by the misogyny in this book.

“That DeeAnne”, Gran said, “she's been pregnant one time I know of. You just take care she doesn't have one of yours, you'lle be paying the rest of your life”
Way to go, Gran! Slutshaming and manwhore-endorsing at the same time! Yay.

Somehow I don't believe her equalism. I don't think she sees fang-bangers as her equals.

The virgin myth and virgin trope.
1) she's a virgin, he's experienced.
2) first time hurts. No. If sex hurts, you are doing it wrong, even if it's the first time. Or there's something wrong. Like physically wrong, something that needs medical attention.
3) this inexperienced girl is a sex goddess who intuitively knows exactly what to do in bed. (Now, sex isn't really that complicated, basically all that's needed for good sex is two people who want to have sex with each other and who like each other. Foreplay and lubrication helps, In this book there is no foreplay. It's in-out, explosions, best sex ever!
4) Best sex ever. Of course it's best sex ever, it's the only sex ever :-D What is she comparing it to? :-D So when she says “all that talk about amazing vampire sex is all true”, I say “how would you know. Have you ever had sex with an ordinary guy?”

Also, the cat. Why is it even there?

She just told him she was molested as a kid, and what does he do? Has sex with her. No.

Telling Sam “you never got in line” as a response to him being upset because she went to Bill even though he warned her, and told her that he wanted her... cold, bitch.
And then she breaks it off with Bill, because of exact the reasons Sam warned her of... bitch!
Also -

“I would never see Bill in the sunlight. I would never fix his breakfast, never meet him for lunch. I could never have a child by Bill, which was nice at least when you thought of not having to practice birth control, but... I'd never call Bill at the office to ask him to stop on the way home for some milk. He'd never join the Rotary, or give a career speech at the high school, or coach Little League Baseball. He'd never go to church with me...“
Er... so what? you could fix him supper and midnight snack. You could meet him for stargazing and full moon watching. You can adopt. You can call him and ask him to stop by the allnight open store for milk. Why would you want your husband to join the Rotary, or give a career speech etc. Why? is that really any reason to break off a relationship? “all these other people getting up and enjoying breakfast together, and I can never have that, boohoo!”. Come on!
YOU COULD HAVE THAT WITH SAM.
I was so down by then that I had to think of an upside...
... he seemed to genuinely care for me. Sex with him was absolutely great. No one would mess with me. I could relax with Bill, a luxury so precious I could not put a value on it.”
YOU COULD HAVE ALL THAT WITH SAM.
But, no. I mean, she likes him as a person, she can't read his mind either, he likes her, she thinks he's good looking - but, alas, NO ISSUES, SO NO RELATIONSHIP. Now, they might end up together in the future, I don't know, I mean... I have seen the tv series, but that's not books. If this book is anything to use as base for speculations, I would assume they'll end up together, but develop some ISSUES, because there has to be ISSUES.

“Why can't you have a regular boyfriend?”
“Because no regular guy asked me out!”
They did. But you can't, because you can read their thoughts and that's SO HORRIBLE, that you want a boyfriend whose mind you cannot read, but - uh oh, that means that THEY CAN HAVE SECRETS FROM YOU!!! And that we cannot have! A serious problem! Nononono...
Bitch.

“I can't have you trying to fine-tune my day-to-day life. I'm gonna get mad at people, people are gonna get mad at me. I can't worry about them being killed. I can't live like that, honey. You see what I'm saying?”
So far you have had problems with people and Bill didn't kill them. The only people he killed were a couple of a-holes who tried to kill you, and would have managed if not for Sam and Bill, and an old great-uncle you haven't even seen for ages. How is that fine-tuning your life? There is NOTHING here to even imply he would go killing people you are angry at.

What's her problem with Harlen? And when Harlen dies - who cares. Good riddance. Harlen who?

And then she suddenly have all these feelings to Bill when the vampire nest gets burned.
I'm not buying any of it.

“I'm not stupid” One of the stupidest things people say.

When I was stumbling over all the tropes, I got the idea of doing a feminist movie evaluation on this book. It passes Bechdel test :-D But I can't say it presents good feminist values. She doesn't have any aspirations, goals, ambitions, dreams, anything. She seems to be totally happy being a waitress and not getting an education. The only reference to future was her woe list about dating Bill and not being able to be a SAHM. Now, there's nothing wrong with that, but... she doesn't have any hobbies, talents, interests... she sits and watches television on her days off. She doesn't do anything with “girls”. We are supposed to believe Arlene is her friend, but - they don't go shopping together, or have coffee, or visit each other - the only time was when she was babysitting Arlene's kids, and Arlene seemed to be more or less scared of Bill...

Oh, that, too! Arlene asks if she can babysit her kids, and she is happy to, but then Arlene asks if Bill will be there, and Sookie says “yes”, and Arlene gets worried, because she doesn't want to let a vampire near her children. And Sookie gets offended by it! Excuse me, bitch! You have known this guy for a couple of weeks, you know what vampires have done, and you can't read his thoughts. You don't really know if you can trust him. What you do know is that he can throw cars around, and if he decides to do anything, there is nothing you can do to stop him. And you have the gumption to get your feelings hurt, because Arlene doesn't trust your boyfriend. The worst part is that Arlene is the one who gives in, is ashamed and “apologizes”, by asking her to babysit the kids again, and doesn't say anything about Bill. And even when you know she is worried, you are only happy to let him in with the kids, and not just that, but when she comes to pick her kids up, there's TWO vampires there, and not even YOU trust the other one! I wouldn't even speak to you again if I was Arlene.

She gets anemic because Bill drinks her blood, but stops taking iron because Bill doesn't like its taste. Excuse me, WHAT?!

She drives drunk. Good job, Charlaine.

The discussion about the poor girl Eric send to Bill.

There were other things, too, but what ever.

Another thing that's good. The new covers based on the tv series are better than the old ones, because I really wanted to read these books because the original covers were so amazing and promised something very different.