Soul Bound by Mari Mancusi

MMancusi-Soul BoundI  enjoyed Blood Ties (book 6 in the Blood Coven Series) by Mari Mancusi and was pleased to get Soul Bound to review to see what shenanigans Sunny & company were up to now.  However, I was slightly disappointed in Soul Bound…that is until right at the ending.

Rayne would do anything to save her twin sister, Sunny, from the Vampire Consortium dictator who wants her dead. Instead, she’s been commissioned by Slayer Inc. to find Sunny and Magnus and deliver them to the Consortium…which Rayne knows means certain death. She also knows that if she and her boyfriend, Jareth, disobey orders, they are signing not only their own death warrants, but also those of every vampire in the Blood Coven.

As a rival slayer with a personal vendetta moves in, Rayne and Jareth must do something to stop her. So they embark on their most dangerous journey yet, deep beneath the streets of New York City and through the Gates of the Underworld. But when a greedy god demands the ultimate sacrifice, will Rayne be forced to choose between her sister…and the vampire she loves?

Soul Bound switches to Rayne’s POV. Since I have not read the first 5 books in this series, I can’t say if the switch in POVs is typical or not. I didn’t really mind the switch, but after reading Soul Bound, I think I prefer Sunny over Rayne. Rayne is cool but I just didn’t really connect with her as much I think I did with Sunny back in Blood Ties.  Also, it had been about three months since I’d read Blood Ties, which for me was a LOT of books ago.  Soul Bound didn’t really have much in the way of information from the previous 5 books, so it took me a bit to remember what exactly was going on and what’s happened to this point. Now I am not a fan of spending a lot of time re-hashing past books, however, a couple sentences here and there to refresh the reader’s mind is helpful and I wish I’d had more of that in Soul Bound.

What I really liked was the added Greek mythology. I LOVE Greek mythology.  Soul Bound incorporates this nicely into the world Mancusi has created and the additions she made were entertaining.  For instance something that really made me laugh…one of Dante’s circles of hell was reserved for e-book pirates.  My applause and appreciation goes out to Mancusi for getting that dig at pirates into Soul Bound. I admit I thought it was pretty awesome *G*.   And HOLY MOLY the ending…and if you think I’m giving it away….HA HA HA yeaaaah…moving on. It’s not a huge cliffhanger but it is enough to make you search for hidden pages going…whaaaa??

I did feel, though, that the plot and action kind of lagged throughout the book.  Soul Bound just didn’t seem to have quite the literary “oomph” I look for when it comes to action and subplots to move the book along.  So, it took me about 2-2.5 hours to finish. It’s typical for me with a YA, but really Soul Bound isn’t as long as other YA novels (think Richelle Mead type length, which usually take me 2.5-3hrs to finish) and I finished Blood Ties in about 90 min.  But, that’s just a “me” thing.

One other quick mention…if there was any romance in earlier books between Rayne and Jareth (obviously this is YA, so no smexy times…but you know, appropriate romantic development for a YA) in prior books, don’t expect it with Soul Bound.  Soul Bound is definitely more focused on the actual plot and Rayne searching for her sister.   With starting this series in book 7 (Blood Ties), I haven’t felt lost in regards to the plot, but I did miss all the main worldbuilding and character and character relationship building that occurs in the first several books.  If you feel you are one of those readers who is fine to not see that type of development, then dive on in…otherwise, you may be best starting back with book 1.

So…when does book 8 come out? *G*

Read Order:
Boys that Bite
Stake That
Girls that Growl
Bad Blood
Night School
Blood Ties
Soul Bound

About Nicole 146 Articles
Attorney by day, Publicist for Barclay Publicity and reviewer/LE (assistant) editor by night. I'm a huge book nerd and love to read. I have 2 dogs, both Labrador retriever mixed breeds, who are very rotten and think they run the house. Let's not lie, they totally do, I just can't them know it ha ha! My usual genre is romance or urban fantasy. I love all things having to do with paranormal, with the occasional good contemp/BDSM/erotica thrown in to spice it all up.