nita Blake lives in a contemporary America where vampires, and other supernatural denizens of the night, are not only real but legally recognized. They exist alongside humanity, governed (as much as they care to be) not only by humanity's laws but by their own rules, and by the supernatural dictates that govern their behavior.
Anita works for Animators Inc., a firm that raises the dead long enough to testify in insurance and criminal cases. As the book opens, she is approached by Leo Harlan, a hit man who wants her to raise one of his ancestors.
Anita is also a famous vampire hunter, known for her skill at dispatching monsters who have crossed the line permitted of them. She is a recognized federal marshal who has established a relationship with the local cops, but who is not always trusted by them.
Events in the previous books have left Anita with a complicated web of personal relationships with a werewolf ex-lover, a vampire servant, another vampire to whom she is bonded as servant, a number of were-leopard companions and a spell called an ardeur that compels her to have sex multiple times a day. When a particularly nasty lady vampire comes over from Europe, it looks like her life is about to become even more complicated than she can handle.
A novel in dire need of a flow chart
It's hard to argue with success, especially since the 10 previous novels have earned Laurell K. Hamilton and Anita Blake a prominent place on the New York Times bestseller list. There are any number of fans who devour each new Anita Blake novel, and who thrill to the increasingly convoluted permutations of the heroine's personal life. As for Anita herself, she is (discounting the labyrinthine backstory that's accumulated around her like lint), a dynamic and compelling character whose toughness, sense of humor, and volatility aren't always sufficient emotional protection from the horrors that comprise her everyday world.
That said, those who approach Cerulean Sins as a stand-alone novel may find themselves in the position of a latecomer to a party where everybody already knows each other and spends their entire night chatting up old times. The backstory is complicated, as is the litany of previously established protocols that determine who's in charge, who gets to stalk whom, who's the servant of whom, and just how often Anita's mystical egg timer is going to require her to have some form of sexual contact right away.
There's so much of this kind of stuff, often discussed at length by characters who really do have much more urgent matters to worry about, that it tends to overwhelm the story. For a long time after the introduction of the evil vampiress Musette—a scene that clearly establishes her as a villain worth watching—Anita seems too busy talking about her own crap to even think about her. This may be an occupational hazard in being a vampire hunter whose personal life requires a flowchart and footnotes, but it also makes Cerulean Sins a poor entry point for the first-time reader. This first-time reader was bored and frustrated.
