Dark Lover
J.R. Ward, 2005
Romance FantasyHorrorContemporary fiction
A nearly blind vampire king, a reporter with nothing to lose, and a brotherhood hunting in a New York city not quite ours: the romance that launched a paranormal empire. A wry reporter's voice carries this vampire romance through New York nights, with horror-edged action and a surprisingly calm, deadpan streak.
Feels like serenity.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy paranormal romance with a reporter heroine, a nearly blind vampire king and a brotherhood patrolling a New York not quite ours. The horror-tinged violence and brooding brotherhood may put you off if you want a gentle, bloodless love story.
Why read it
It launched a long paranormal series, so it works as a moody, wry entry point into a New York where vampires keep their own rules.
A page from the book
What a crowd looks like from the edge of someone else's death.
In her time as a reporter, she’d found that murder was a community event in Caldwell. Well, certainly for everyone except the man or woman who’d actually done the dying. For the victim, she had to imagine death was an alone kind of thing, even if he or she were staring into the face of the killer. Some bridges you crossed on your own, no matter who drove you to the edge. J.R. Ward.J.R. Ward is a pseudonym for Jessica Bird, who had already published contemporary romances before Dark Lover launched the Black Dagger Brotherhood in 2005.
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Questions readers ask
- Is Dark Lover for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy paranormal romance with a reporter heroine, a nearly blind vampire king and a brotherhood patrolling a New York not quite ours. The horror-tinged violence and brooding brotherhood may put you off if you want a gentle, bloodless love story.
- What is Dark Lover like?
- A wry reporter's voice carries this vampire romance through New York nights, with horror-edged action and a surprisingly calm, deadpan streak. Feels like serenity.
- What should I read after Dark Lover?
- If you liked Dark Lover, try Silence (Becca Fitzpatrick), The Turn of the Key (Ruth Ware) and The Last Thing He Told Me (Laura Dave).
A taste of the feed
The childhood game you’d play in a place that now frightens you.
I stood at the foot of the sloping bridge, gripping the stone wall for support. I was sure the maybe-officer had seen me, but I moved into the shadows of the trees bowing over the river’s edge anyway. From my peripheral vision, the black water of the Wentworth River glinted. As kids, Vee and I had crouched under this very bridge, catching crawdads from the riverbank by inserting sticks speared with hotdog pieces into the water. The crawdads had fastened their claws to the hotdog, refusing to let go even when we lifted them out of the river and shook them loose in a bucket.
Silence · Becca Fitzpatrick
The line works as a thesis for the epistolary thriller: the narrator’s voice is both evidence and defence.
People do go mad, you know, if you stop them from sleeping for long enough...
The Turn of the Key · Ruth Ware
How a tragedy hides inside an ordinary Tuesday.
This is the terrible thing about a tragedy. It isn’t with you every minute. You forget it, and then you remember it again.
The Last Thing He Told Me · Laura Dave
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