Once Burned by Jeaniene Frost – a Review
Once Burned by Jeaniene Frost is the first book (June 26, 2012 release) of her new Night Prince series. Night Prince is a spinoff from Jeaniene’s Night Huntress series. I am a big fan of Jeaniene Frost, and love her Night Huntress series, including Night Huntress World. If you have not read any of these series, you are missing out on some of the best and hottest characters in paranormal…Bones was up there face to face to Barrons in the contest of hottest male fictional characters, that alone should tell you what you are missing. But Jeaniene has so many good characters…Cat, Mencheres, Spade, Ian, Denise, Kira and so many more. Now back to Once Burned…..and Vlad…Just take look at the cover…sigh..this has to be one of the best covers ever. You can go ask Sandy, who is that hot guy playing Vlad *grins* Ok let’s review Once Burned.
Leila, a human girl, is the heroine of Once Burned. Of course, Vlad, the original inspiration of vampires back to Dracula, is our wonderful hero. We have already known Vlad, and his abilities with fire. We know Vlad and Cat (night huntress) are friends, and he is an enemy to Bones, but that is another story. Other then a short appearance, this is truly only Leila and Vlad. It all begins when Leila, who when she was a teenager, had a tragic accident that disfigured her, and caused her to have electricity throughout her body. She cannot touch with her right hand anyone for fear of electrocuting them, and because of this, she ran away from her family, and has lived with a carnival group for the last few years. Leila can also by touching a person, see their memories. Only her friend Marty, a vampire, whom she lives with, knows about her abilities, but he watches over her, and loves her as a father figure. However, a vampire group discovers her, and they want to use her abilities to their advantage, and they succeed in kidnapping her.
The evil vampire that had her kidnapped wants to use her to help find Vlad, whom he wants to kill. While forced to do their bidding, she tries to mentally sense Vlad, but to her surprise, he can sense her intrusion to his mind. He has the same ability and can see her. When he asks her who and why she is invading his thoughts, she decides that he might be the less dangerous to deal with then the evil vampire that kidnapped her. She pleads to Vlad for help, and he goes to her rescue, as he also wants to find out who is out to kill him.
When Vlad arrives, he kills the vampires in a fiery fight, and then he takes Leila back to home in Romania. Vlad finds Leila intriguing, not to mention enamored by her abilities, which have some similarity to his…some.
Jeaniene Frost does such a wonderful job showing the attraction between both of them. Vlad, who can be very arrogant and confident, expects Leila to be seduced by him. Leila, who is nothing that Vlad has ever experience, is a tough and stubborn woman. Though she finds herself attracted more and more to Vlad, she dislikes his arrogance. It is so much fun to watch them try to be one step ahead of each other. Vlad goes so far as to let any member of his group to pursue Leila, if she wants. He is that confident. Poor Maximus, who does step forward, and will be sadly disappointed when he gets nowhere, as Leila only thinks of Vlad.
But she is determined, and stubborn, and she stands up to Vlad all the time. He is so used to people bowing down to him, and not arguing or fighting his command. Vlad doesn’t know it yet, but he has met his match in Leila, and at the same time, Leila cannot control her sexual attraction to the very sexy Vlad. This part of their coming together was a lot of fun, as Jeaniene has a way to add so much humor. Vlad hearing Leila’s as she thought about him was funny. When Bones teaches Leila how to block someone from reading her thoughts, by singing in her head, the worst song she can think of over and over to push anyone out of her head…funny
When they finally come together, it was very well done and hot. Leila was a virgin because of her shock ability, she could never have any kind of sexual relationship. But Vlad is able to handle it, and Leila sees her dreams and desires come true. To love and be loved, to able to touch, and feel sensations she has never known. Loved Leila and Vlad together.
The rest of the book was very exciting, as Leila is very much in danger, with the evil vampire still out there looking for Vlad, and he wants Leila as a tool. Vlad brings Leila’s family to his home to protect them from the danger, much to Leila’s chagrin, as she was not close to her family. Eventually Leila does get kidnapped again, due to her foolishness in not listening to Vlad. It was an explosive ending, as Leila learns to use her ability, which is becoming a weapon by itself. She helps Vlad and her new friends against the powerful enemy. It was an explosive ending, with a conclusion, but a lot of the overall story is left open. We have to wait for the next book in this series to return to Vlad and Leila.
Reviewed by Barb
