Review: Darkness Dawns

Dianne Duvall
PNR
320 pages
Immortal Guardians #1
Chapter 1


Synopsis:

Once, Sarah Bingham's biggest challenge was making her students pay attention in class. Now, after rescuing a wounded stranger, she's landed in the middle of a battle between corrupt vampires and powerful immortals who also need blood to survive. Roland Warbrook is the most compelling man Sarah has ever laid hands on. But his desire for her is mingled with a hunger he can barely control. . .

In his nine centuries of immortal existence, no woman has tempted Roland as much as Sarah. But asking her to love him is impossible--when it means forfeiting the world she's always known, and the life he would do anything to protect. . .

Review: 
When I first started reading Darkness Dawns I was sure that it was going to be the next Black Dagger Brotherhood.  In fact, I took to Goodreads saying exactly that.  Unfortunately, that's not exactly the case here. The book had all the makings of being the next big series to watch, but somehow lost it for me as time went on. 


The great thing about Diane Duvall's new Immortal Guardians series was the many characters that kept being introduced.  The story starts out with a traumatic event which brings our heroine Sarah and the story's hero Roland together, and you think the story is going to be just about them. But it's not.  Duvall introduces the rest of the immortals naturally, and they become characters you end up wanting to know more about.   There's the super secret leader Seth, and Marcus who you can't help but sympathize with once he reveals his broken heart.  There's even a female immortal, Lisette. {is that the first time that there's been a female "brother"}  The camaraderie between the immortal brothers and sister was my favorite part of the book.  


Overall the book moved quickly, and up until about 2/3 of the story I was engrossed and dying to know the outcome.  Then something happened. Now, the story ends fair enough and the characters hold interest enough to warrant another look at the series. But, as time went on in this book, the story and even some of the character's drive became more and more uneven.  For example, Sarah basically saves Roland from an excruciating death in the very beginning by being this strong women that didn't back down, but all of a sudden you start to realize that she's giving up her whole identity to this guy.  She's ready to give up her immortality a few days in to knowing this guy, and it made me start to dislike everything I originally liked about her.  Now don't go yelling at me, I know this is a PNR and not UF.  She can be attracted to this guy {even unexplainably so} but I just wanted her to fight for more of herself.  She almost became part of the background by book's end.  Honest. And unfortunately it wasn't just her that took an unjustifiable, and almost book-ruining, change for me. Some of the things that made up Roland's persona started to not make sense.  I was even yelling at the villan of the story, saying "Really, villain? REALLY?!"  


Ultimately, I wound up being disappointed with the last 1/3 of the book. Which makes me really really sad because the writing was good, and the character's foundations were solid and interesting.  The world holds weight, and hopefully the next book will be more concrete. 


Bottom Line: Wishy washy reviews mean only one thing. That you should go out and decide for yourself.  Duvall's first Immortals story is good, not great.


3 stars