Cravings

First: there's no action in this one. Anita is stuck in "relationship" mode, which for her means sex: thinking about it, talking about it, and defining her relationships around it. That's the downside. The upside is that Hamilton seems to be making strides towards resolving the conflicts Anita has been caught up for the last few books... that is to say, Anita is starting to understand and come to grips with the problem.

As might be expected, the story feels almost like a setup for the next novel (which, by the blurb, has a promising plot). There is a fair amount of Anita-spection about the fix she happens to be in, and one event likely to have serious repercussions -- serious enough that I'm surprised it was released in a short story that some fans will inevitably miss. It will be interesting to see how the forthcoming novel (Incubus Dreams) handles that.

Overall, the story is fairly well written. Although the it retains the blatant eroticism of the other recent Blake novels, it offers hope of resolution, and thus it's enough to keep me reading for the present. I've been disappointed by the way that the erotic elements of the Blake stories seem to be taking over, and I keep telling myself that I'll stop reading if the next book doesn't improve the situation. So far it is improving, but in little baby steps.

If you've been following the Anita Blake series for a while, and have been waiting for the next book, this will keep you satisfied for a little while. If you're new to the series, this isn't the place to start; try Guilty Pleasures. If you're not sure whether you want to continue with the series, don't buy this collection; wait for a review of the next book and buy that.