Definitely Dead (Gollancz S.F.)

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Customer Reviews: Read 144 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Definitely Delightful May 4, 2006
98 out of 104 found this review helpful

I love the Southern Vampire series so much. I have enjoyed every last book - to the hilt - and this one was no exception. What I love is how the books are heartwarming, heartbreaking, poignant, funny, suspenseful, romantic...all at once. The characters are amazingly well drawn and Sookie's evolution from book to book as she gains confidence, experience, and some hard knocks is so fascinating. That alone makes this installment worthwhile.

Sookie is definitely a bit snappish throughout the book, but she's also more confident, more sure of herself - more willing to take initiative. She's tired of being manipulated and she's trying, as hard as she can, to get control of her life. It's no surprise that she's on the bristly side.

Sookie visits New Orleans and learns more about how vampire society works - she meets the Queen, who wants to employ her directly. So the power relationship is obviously shifting a bit between Sookie and the Bon Temps supes. I think this is a Very Promising Development.

The romantic interest here is Quinn, a were-tiger who oozes machismo. I found him a little bit campy. Eric and Bill appear - not often, but enough. There are some *major* revelations in that department, which pleased me inordinately (And, not to give away too much, but I have loathed Bill since Dead Until Dark).

There's also more afoot on other fronts - the continuing drama of Debbie Pelt & the Fellowship of the Sun & Claudine's mysterious presence.

I always feel totally drenched in the physical environment of the Southern Vampire books - Harris writes about the south in such a vivid way it can make a die-hard California girl like myself want to visit Louisiana just to see the pollen or drive down a narrow country lane. New Orleans, however, gets a more-or-less minimal treatment: Sookie doesn't get much of a chance to explore.

Alas. A year until the next one comes out.

3 out of 5 stars

Definitely not my favorite book in the series... May 3, 2006
73 out of 98 found this review helpful

I look forward to reading the Southern Vampire Mysteries every year (well, every year since I discovered them). The first four books were the best of the series. (Dead as a Doornail was great too though.) I had looked forward to reading Definitely Dead and read more on sexy weretiger Quinn. Even though I had a hard time conjuring a gorgeous baldheaded, olive-skinned man, I do like Quinn a bit, though I need to know more about him. However, I wasn't thrilled with this installment and its "twists." But more on that stuff later. Hadley, Sookie Stackhouse's cousin, had been a vampire. She was murdered and is now definitely dead (as opposed to being vampire-dead). Hadley's apartment and her possessions now belong to Sookie, and she has been summoned by the Vampire Queen of Louisiana to claim them. Sookie is disturbed with the fact that her cousin had been a vampire. She had taken part in the execution of her cousin's murderer (this took place in the short story "One Word Answer" in the Bite anthology) and she isn't thrilled with the prospect of seeing the apartment and visiting the vampire queen. But someone is doing just about anything, including committing murder, to keep Sookie from claiming her inheritance. Did Hadley have some skeletons in her closet? Who is stopping Sookie from going to New Orleans and why? On top of everything else, the Pelts are again questioning Sookie about their daughter Debbie's disappearance, Eric is insisting upon taking her to a vampire council meeting and some Weres may want her dead. All poor Sookie wants to do is enjoy a few dates with the gorgeous Quinn. There are several twists throughout the novel.

I have to say that the first one-hundred or so pages are quite boring. There is some building of what is to come ahead, but most of it is too short and sparse to spark my interest. The scenes at bar Merlotte are always fun and Harris's descriptions of the south and of Sookie relaxing on a warm sunny day are great too, and I enjoy the witty dialogue as well, but the other stuff centered on internal monologue and on Sookie getting reacquainted with practically every character in the series was a big bore for me. In the first one-hundred or so pages, we get appearances or mentions of Bill, Alcide, Sam, Eric, Jason, Claude, Claudine, Maria-Star, Quinn, Calvin, the Pelts, Merlotte's regulars and several very small, filler characters, some of which I couldn't remember at first. Out of all those characters, I was only interested in Bill, Eric and Quinn. It seems that Ms. Harris felt the need to bring up these characters even if most of them were not relevant to the plot. It matters little to me if some of them are in one of the novels or not. Perhaps a brief mention of them would suffice. After we got out of that hallway, which included a mini-mystery centered on a missing school boy, the story got interesting and the action began. I was enjoying the story a great deal... until I read the part about the "twist" with Bill. I had a feeling that it was a contrived plot device to write him off the series or to make him unlikeable to us readers. I hate it when authors do that! Laurell K. Hamilton did it with Richard and now Charlaine Harris has done it with Bill. But I sincerely hope that isn't the case, for Bill is my favorite character in this series and I'd hate to see him go. He has done some vile things to Sookie that don't make him good boyfriend material, but what I like about him and Eric is that they're flawed and complex and not vanilla vampires. The point of vampires is that they don't behave or think like regular people. Also, I'd like to read about his side of things. Ever since Club Dead, it has been all about Sookie and her broken heart, with very little opportunity to have Bill defend himself. I hope this new twist is just new conflict between him and Sookie and nothing else. It is obvious to me that Ms. Harris has put Bill and the other men "in the back burner" in favor of Quinn. As for Quinn, I have no idea what to make of him yet. He is likeable, but kind of one-dimensional thus far. He is definitely not as interesting or as colorful as Eric and Bill. I hope Ms. Harris won't do with Quinn what LKH has done with Anita Blake's Micah and have Quinn become Sookie's "soulmate." *shudder* Anyway, Definitely Dead has its fun and entertaining moments, but the problems above kept me from enjoying this one the way I had enjoyed the previous installments. This was nevertheless entertaining and I'm sure that many Sookie fans will enjoy it. I hope against hope that Charlaine Harris won't take the direction I suspect she will take though.

3 out of 5 stars

Still Good but What the . . .? May 3, 2006
21 out of 28 found this review helpful

*Spoilers Ahead*

Early Synopsis: A revisionist take on the Sookie universe.

Bill - You poor, miserable *expletive.* What happened? First, you suddenly became an adulterer. Now, you're suddenly a seducer? Time to throw yourself on the stake, buddy. Next, you'll be a rapist - oh wait, right, that happened at the same time you suddenly became an adulterer. Oy.

Sookie -- Still love her, but there are problems. For one, I don't care if Debbie was Satan incarnate, don't cop an attitude with her grieving (and rightly p.o.'d) family - even if they are ruthless kidnappers. And fairy blood? FAIRY? When? How? Why? And how did this somewhat pertinent fact escape all of Sookie's supernatural boyfriends? I understand that Andre had a special fairy detector for a nose, but Eric and Bill fed on her. Why did we have to wait to book 7(?) to find out all of this? It could be an interesting plot twist - or it could be another ardeur. Fairy blood doesn't really solve the problem of Sookie's suitors. It justifies giving her more of them. And to me, that's a problem.

Eric - Let's see him in something more than a cameo.

Quinn - Stop saying "babe," OK, dude? I liked Quinn in the last book, I liked him still in this book, but he is coming across a bit as a Poochie (Simpsons ref).

Shifters in general - I'm a bit biased b/c Anita Blake has probably ruined shifter romances for me forever. But look at the list here: Sam, Alcide, Calvin, now Quinn. Unless we're talking were-gerbils next, I don't care. It is time to call the Dr. Ludwig-equivalent of veterinary science, and end all of this by neutering the lot of them. /bitterness.

Plot Resolution - Sookie does her best Velma impersonation and explains all the stuff that didn't make any sense. So the diamond was in the coffee? A few quick calls to the gas stations solved the mystery? I don't know. I'm still trying to figure out how the heck 2+2=5 here. I understand what happened, but it's hard to believe.

End: A better book than "Club Dead" with an interesting (if completely out of left field) twist on Bill's character, and a good set-up for future conflict. Scooby-Doo-like mysteries and flat villains weaken the mystery plot, and Sookie-Nookie becomes increasingly problematic as new characters sweep in and steal the limelight from older, better characters. 3/5

4 out of 5 stars

Sookie returns May 19, 2006
15 out of 20 found this review helpful

Sookie Stackhouse is a small town cocktail waitress in Louisiana. Her telepathic abilities make her too scary for humans to feel comfortable around, much less date. However, the supernatural beings "sups" do not feel threatened by her at all. In fact, they seem drawn to her. Humans now know that vampires walk among them. That does not mean humans accept vampires though, many do not. And humans still do not know about all the other types of sups that exist.

Sookie takes time off from work and returns to New Orleans for various reasons. The more important one is so Sookie can go through Hadley's possessions. It is a task that Sookie has put off since her vampire cousin died - again. Yet someone is going out of their way to keep Sookie from doing it. It could be some rogue weres who reject Sookie as a friend of the pack, the vampire queen (Sophie-Anne) of Louisiana, the Pelt family (who still bugs Sookie about Debbie's disappearance), or even someone that Sookie still believes is a friend.

Whoever it is, they are out to stop Sookie from digging into Hadley's past. So once again, Sookie's life in peril.

**** To put it bluntly, you must read the previous novels before this one or you will be lost. Once the story gets rolling, it R-O-C-K-S! Until then, I was bombarded with characters as the author attempts to tell who is what creature, their history, etc. It got tedious to me at some points because many of these characters have nothing to do with this story. It's as if the author wants to give every character from the previous books a tiny cameo appearance. Telling about each character takes a lot longer than the actual "Hi Sookie. Bye Sookie." does. Once all that is out of the way, the plot takes off running and never slows down.

Rumors say this is the last book in the series. (That could explain all the cameos.) However, the author could decide to publish at least one more adventure. There is potential trouble at Merlotte's Bar, a vampire summit, and Sookie's soon to be new in-laws that could give lots of explosive material for the author to build on. I won't even go into how the local law enforcement would like to use her telepathic abilities or the sup-men in her love life. I can only hope that another novel in this series appears someday. I will certainly be keeping my eye out for one. ****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch of Huntress Reviews.

2 out of 5 stars

Boring May 11, 2006
12 out of 18 found this review helpful

I really look forward to this series. Her characters are ones that I find have "personality" or at least developed some over the series.

However, this book was just plain boring. The story didn't go anywhere at all. The whole missing braclet -- she didn't explain to the reader what was going on when she found it -- she told Quinn but we couldn't read about it for 40 more pages until she went to the reception. I found the whole vampire reception confusing. More back story should have been provided.

I believe that even the author felt that this wasn't the best -- the last paragraph of the book sums up all the untold plots and story lines that were not covered.

And, the very last page of the book encourages us to read something else for a change of pace. Perhaps this author is just burned out on these characters.

If you are on the fence, don't even bother reading this one in the series. You missed nothing of any importance in Sookie's life.

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