Review: Blood Rights by Kristen Painter

Title: Blood Rights (House of Comarré, #1)
Author: Kristen Painter
Pages: 392 (ARC copy)
Publisher: Orbit
Release Date: September 27, 2011

Born into a life of secrets and service, Chrysabelle’s body bears the telltale marks of a comarré—a special race of humans bred to feed vampire nobility. When her patron is murdered, she becomes the prime suspect, which sends her running into the mortal world…and into the arms of Malkolm, an outcast vampire cursed to kill every being from whom he drinks.

Now Chrysabelle and Malkolm must work together to stop a plot to merge the mortal and supernatural worlds. If they fail, a chaos unlike anything anyone has ever seen will threaten to reign.

My Thoughts: The world of this series is set in the not so distant future. There seems to have been a major war, at least in the Americas, and there are advances in technology, but minus the vampires and other supernatural beings, it doesn't feel too different from the world we live in today. That was something I liked because it was easy to imagine and I tend to like stories set in the future more so than the past. So, in Blood Rights, it is the year 2067, and the covenant that protects humans from the supernatural world is close to being destroyed. However, before that can be fulfilled, the ring of sorrows must be found.

As a comarré, Chrysabelle's life in Romania has revolved around protecting her vampire patron Lord Algernon and offering him her blood. Allowing her patron to drink her blood helps them both gain strength and power and prevents Chrysabelle's blood from building up and poisoning her body. Chrysabelle dreams of escaping of her comarré duties, but it seems unlikely that her patron will ever give her the freedom she desires. That all changes when Algernon is found murdered. Although Chrysabelle is finally free, she is accused by noble vampires of murdering Algernon. She is forced to go on the run, seeking refugee with her comarré aunt in New Florida. It is there that she encounters a dangerous anathema vampire named Malkolm, who may be able to help her prove her innocence, and finds out that the ring her patron gave her before he died may be the real reason she is being hunted.

Blood Rights is told from the perspective of various characters, the main ones being Chrysabelle, Malkolm (or Mal), and the power-hungry noble vampire Tatiana. Chrysabelle would have to be my favorite out of all the characters. She's disciplined and serious. I really liked that she could hold her own in a fight, and it was a bit amusing how she tried adjusting to a world that didn't fit with the comarré lifestyle she was used to. The relationship she has with the castaway noble vampire Mal is an interesting one. Mal's cursed with a beast inside him and voices in his head that constantly demand he kill Chrysabelle, and it takes a lot of self-control from him to ignore the urge. Because of this Chrysabelle and Mal have a hard time trusting each other and are always clashing in the beginning, but once they get to know one another, the walls between them begin to slowly crumble and they come to care for each other just a bit. Both are actually very caring of the people they love and consider their allies and would do anything to protect them. There isn't quite a romantic relationship between them in this book, but it's obvious they are attracted to one another. I have a feeling their relationship will continue to develop, and I can't wait to read more about them and find out where their relationship goes.

While I liked Chrysabelle and Mal, I can't say I particularly liked Tatiana. Tatiana is a vampire who wants one thing only: power. It seems she's been scheming for awhile now to replace Lord Algernon as Elder, and she desperately wants to become Dominus, the ruler of her noble vampire family. She didn't have the greatest life as a human and suffered some tragedies, but I felt that wasn't enough to explain why she became cruel and power-hungry. Maybe she's just easily influenced. Or maybe there is still plenty more to learn about her. Whatever the reason I found it very hard empathizing with her throughout the book and understanding her purpose in siding with evil. To me she just came off as selfish and even a bit delusional, and I didn't think she was even close to being the scariest or evilest character in the book. I'm curious to know what happens to her; however, I hope she acquires some redeeming qualities because at the moment I don't believe I can bring myself to feel sorry for her.

Ever since I saw the amazing covers for this series, I knew I wanted to read Blood Rights. I'm glad I had the opportunity to read it early, and the great thing is that the next two books will be released within only two months after Blood Rights's official release in September. So, the wait isn't long at all. Overall I thought it was a pretty solid first book for the House of Comarré series, and I look forward to finding out what happens next with Chrysabelle and Mal.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Thanks to Good Choice Reading ARC Tours for providing the ARC!