Skin Trade

I love books with a strong heroine, and I personally own every single Laurell K. Hamilton book I can in hardcover. I'm sorry to say this 17th book was a disappointment. Anita felt weak in this book. She even sounded weak. She spent a good deal of time whining and internalizing. In scenes where she could have come across as the powerful necromancer / Executioner, her strengths were waffled away through a continual narrative focus on whether she'd fed the ardeur yet. And who was going to feed her. And who thought who else was sleeping with her.

Marmee Noir is killed off in the last few pages or so of the book. After building her up to the Mother of all Vampires over the course of several books, this seemed abrupt and anticlimactic. Vittorio - who seems to be an interesting and powerful replacement for her in the story line - is killed off shortly thereafter. The jinns were interesting but never went anywhere. The title - “Skin Trade” - to be honest, not even sure how that ties into what happened in the book.