Velvet

Velvet: Temple West

First rule of dealing with hot vampire bodyguards? Don't fall in love.

After losing both her parents before age seventeen, aspiring designer Caitlin Holte feels like her whole world has been turned upside down, and that was before the terrifying encounter with a supernatural force. Then, she learns that her hot bad-boy neighbor, Adrian—who might have just saved her life—is actually a half-demon vampire.

Suddenly Caitlin is stuck with a vampire bodyguard who feels that the best way to protect her is to become her pretend boyfriend. Trouble is, Caitlin is starting to fall in love for real, while Adrian can never love a human. Caitlin trusts Adrian to keep her safe from his demon father, but will he be able to protect her heart?

I freaking love vampire stories. It is no secret that I'm still super obsessed with The Sookie Stackhouse novels, even though the series is over now :(. I love everything about the vampire genre, except I've never actually read Twilight. I don't have anything against it, but I just never really picked it up. However, I do know that paranormal books aren't for everybody! I'm pretty particular with vampire stories just because my expectations are so high after the Sookie series. 

"Maybe actually punching someone in the face instead of just wishing 

I could punch someone in the face would make me feel a little better."

So - why am I particular about vampire stories? I just like the original folklore surrounding vampires. You know - they can't go out in the daytime, they are sensitive to silver, a stake through the heart kills them, superhuman strength, etc. It's hard to find fun vampire novels that have all of these things because  I guess it's pretty inconvenient for the storyline if main character's can't go out in the daytime. Velvet didn't really follow the original folklore of vampirism, which kind of bothered me. Adrian is the vampire bodyguard. He can go out during the daytime - but he did have superhuman strength and needed blood to sustain himself. There was really no mention of silver or stakes, but maybe just because it was a topic that really didn't have an opportunity to present itself. Anyway, I just feel like books that say a character is a vampire but they just do all the things humans do is kind of useless, like a pretend vampire or something. 

There were a few things that I'm still kind of confused on. Caitlin would have these nightmares, but we never really figured out why. It kind of seemed like they only started after the whole demon thing was brought up but I wish there was more explanation about them. It is a series, so maybe that will be explained more in the upcoming books. Another thing I was confused on was Adrian's brother, Julian. Julian kind of seemed to hate humans in the beginning, but by the end he was not really minding Adrian and Caitlin together. Was there a turning point for him or did he just not really care anymore? OMG Adrian's other brother Lucian was so freaking cute. I guarantee you'll love him if you read this! He was a young vampire so he really didn't feel any hate towards humans and didn't understand why they couldn't be friends with them. 

"'Hi'. I returned, and climbed into the passenger side. 'You're still a vampire?'

'Yep.'

'Cool, yeah, just checking.'"

This book was super fun. That's not really the first thing that comes to mind when you think of vampires and demons, but it honestly really was. Even though the vampires in this book weren't my all time favorite, it was still a great read. Caitlin and Adrian was a blossoming romance, and it wasn't really insta-love either. It was a great paranormal romance! I was never bored, which is really important for me when reading a book. If you liked Velvet, I guarantee you'll love the Sookie Stackhouse series! It's like Velvet but New Adult-y and the vampires follow the original myths without it becoming too monotonous. I definitely think that I'll be continuing with the Velvet series, especially because it ended on a little cliff-hanger! Will you be reading Velvet? Do you have a favorite vampire book series?