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UNDEAD AND UNEMPLOYED
by Mary Janice Davidson
Berkley Sensation, August 2004
304 pages
$5.99
ISBN: 0425197484


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

The only screaming you'll be doing reading this vampire novel is shrieking with laughter. Betsy Taylor was killed in UNDEAD AND UNWED, only to awaken as the world's most hilarious vampire queen. Uninterested in vampire politics and unkillable by normal standards, she did her best to blow off both the insane master of the city and the maddeningly sexy and sexist Sinclair who claims to be her consort.

In UNDEAD AND UNEMPLOYED Betsy rises again. Determined to ignore the inconvenient facts of her death and vampirehood, she manages to find her own heaven on earth ­- selling designer shoes at Macys in the Mall of America. Unfortunately, no matter how hard she tries to avoid the world of the undead, it continues to reach out to her. A hit team is killing the vampires of Minnesota and they beg their indestructible queen to do something about it.

How did humans get such detailed knowledge of the vampire society? Who created and funded this hit team, and can they learn that there are good vampires in the world? And most importantly, is Betsy really as invulnerable as everyone thinks?

I have adored both books in this charming, silly series. The greatest delight lies in how Davidson dances you up to all the threadbare conventions of the Dracula genre, only to pull the rug out from under you and make you laugh at the pratfall. My favorite sentence sums up the tone well: "It seems ridiculous that those green eyes would never again flash fire, that her red lips would never form the words idiot or moron or asshole ever again."

Not only is the writing witty, the characters are also a delight. Betsy knows that she is self-centered, shallow and overly fashion-conscious, but she is saved from complete superficiality by her deep concern for people. She is also one of the few romantic heroines who is true to herself. No matter how her circumstances have changed and what the ones around her try to turn her into, she stubbornly, wonderfully, clings to her own values and makes no excuses for her own tastes. This makes her strong in all the ways that count.

It is a strength that her hero is learning to accommodate, just as he must make allowances for her greater powers. In many lesser books, Sinclair would just be the smoldering, demanding, charismatic, sexy and sexist hero. In Davidson's series he is all of those things -­ but he is also utterly disarmed and I am charmed when Betsy calls him out every time he patronizes her. The end result is a bickering, funny, fast-paced relationship right out of the great 50s madcap movies.

Although the mystery part of UNDEAD AND UNEMPLOYED is tissue-thin, there are so many other advantages that I still recommend this book and this whole series to anyone who likes a good laugh.

Reviewed by Linnea Dodson, May 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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