Who knew ferrets could be so cool

Did you know that some bloggers get books sent to them directly from publishers just to review??!  Sign me the hell up.  Seriously, how does one get a gig like that? I am totally looking into the specifics.  I spend at least eighty percent of my entertainment budget on books.  At least.

Until I am deemed cool enough to review for free, I have a lot of catching up to do; with my new fantasy boyfriend.  I'm about five years and six books behind.  Unfortunately, because I am so far behind in the Cal Leandros series I'm having a hard time finding the next few books in the series.  But never fear, I got the next best thing; I picked up a newer book by the same author.  It's just a different series.  A different set of brothers; a different type of monster; a different large US city.  I'm sensing a pattern here, aren't you?

via RobThurman.net

Chimera by Rob Thurman has brothers, very bad villains, really cool guns, and a ferret.  What more could a girl want in a standby, fill-in boyfriend?  No, I can't think of anything else either. 

In all seriousness though, Chimera has its own stand-alone street cred.  It does have a few similarities to Nightlife but it is a completely different story with different relationships, characters and energy.  Thurman's writing style has changed slightly from her 2006 debut but it still has the same raw beauty I loved in my intro book.  It was a little disorienting at first, what with an updated sentence structure approach but Chimera opened up about a quarter of the way through and became a truly delightful read.  I definitely think the slow start was all on my side since I did not "grow" with Thurman's style over several books but rather jumped ahead.

The story is not fantasy but could probably still be considered scifi given the genetics play.  The best part was how Thurman made the theories very plausible.  I could totally see some form of government funded crazy genetic experiments being performed that resemble what she has in this storyline.  Of course, I am a conspiracy theorist so anything is possible.  It is really the characters that make this book a gem.  Once again, they are believable and deep for an opening sequence.  The story had a nice twist at the end too, which was not the twist I expected exactly.  Thurman does write good side characters; my favorite personality in this book was Saul, a sidekick to Stefan.  He steals every scene he is in.

The villains in this series are very human but still just as nasty as the "demons" Cal and Niko face.  Actually, these bad guys might be just a shade worse because they are human.  The writing showcases the darkness in the baddies hearts well; I'm amazed at the clarity of human vileness.

Overall, it was a good story (solid A- on the BrewedB reading scale) and did the job of tiding me over while I searched for Moonlight, the next Cal book.  I scored a copy a few days ago and can't wait to dig in however, I'm heading to my local bookstore to pick up Basilisk, the next book in the Chimera series.  It was released today and promises to be every bit as entertaining as its predecessor.

Happy Reading!
BrewedB