"The Dead Girl's Dance" (book 2 of the Morganville Vampire series) by Rachel Caine

"The Dead Girl's Dance"
(book 2 of the Morganville Vampire series)
by Rachel Caine
read by Cynthia Holloway
produced by Tantor Audio


It's time to continue int the Morganville Vampire series by Rachel Caine. Morganville, Texas is home to Texas Prairie University and Vampires. The university attracts new, young "blood" and the vampires rule the town. The locals are all under protection from a vampire patron, the families enter a contract which means they are protected, very much like life insurance, but instead of a payout when you pass on, you simply don't pass on by the hands of a vampire.

Claire Danvers is a super-smart 16 year-old that has graduated high school early and instead of going to a big name university she decides to start out with a couple of years at TPU. After being the butt-end of some hazing she moves off campus and into the Glass House, with the residents that all seem fairly normal, Michael Glass who owns the house, Eve the goth girl and Shane the video gamer. She learns the secrets of Morganville from her new roommates and soon the trouble begins.

After the big battle in book one which lead to the residents of the Glass House receiving protection from Morganville's founder and strongest Vampire, Amelie, It doesn't get any easier. In fact things may have been made worse. During the worst of the battle when things looked grim, Shane made a mysterious phone call, calling in the cavalry. It turns out the cavalry was Shane's dad and the anti-vampire biker gang set to destroy Morganville, at least to kill all vampires.

"The Dead Girls' Dance" starts out right at that cliffhanger of an ending from book one. With Shane's dad ready to kill. He starts out by killing Michael, thinking Michael is a vampire. His cohort stabs Michael then they cut off his head and burys him in the backyard. Not good for the Glass House. The protection was as long as all four friends stayed together and in Morganville and never cross Amelie. Shane's dad is out to kill all vampires and that may just break the protection circumstances.

Hearing that his dad has targeted the vampire Brandon as his first kill, Shane, even though he hates vampires and especially Brandon, goes out to save Brandon. Shane is found next to Brandon's dead body and since that is the most severe law to break in Morganville, killing a vampire, Shane is locked in a cage in the town's square set to die by incineration, unless Claire and the rest can find proof Shane did not do the killing.

So Eve and Michael and Claire set out to find proof. Yes, I said Michael, sure he's not a vampire but he is a ghost. The only problem is that being a ghost he is held by the power of the house, so he cannot leave Glass House, but on the bright side, he cannot die. One of the many plans the group come up with is to find a vampire to help them sneak into the square and help Shane escape. The vampire they find to help them is Sam. Wait till you hear what Sam's secrets are. No I won't tell, you'll have to listen and hear for yourself, otherwise you may not believe me.

To find Sam, Eve and Claire must attend the campus dance called "The Dead Girls' Dance." The problems really hit when Shane's dad and his biker buddies decide to crash the dance.

Once again while Cynthia Holloway does a pretty decent job of reading the story and has pretty good vocal characterization, she still needs to work on her pronunciation skills. On of the words in this one that stands out is here pronunciation of the word "nuclear." You guessed it she pronounces as "Nucular." There are others but that one stands out the most in this book. Other than that some good listening to this Tantor Audio book version of "The Dead Girls' Dance," by Rachel Caine.