Mary’s review of Ghost Town (Morganville Vampires #9) by Rachel Caine.
While developing a new system to maintain Morganville’s defenses, student Claire Danvers discovers a way to amplify vampire mental powers. Through this, she’s able to re-establish the field around this vampire-infested Texas college town that protects it from outsiders.
But the new upgrades have an unexpected consequence: people inside the town begin to slowly forget who they are-even the vampires. Soon, the town’s little memory problem has turned into a full-on epidemic. Now Claire needs to figure out a way to pull the plug on her experiment- before she forgets how to save Morganville…
I read the first several books in this series and, for some reason, haven’t picked any up again until GHOST TOWN, which is the ninth book in the Morganville Vampires series. A lot has happened to Claire and her friends since last I visited them. Claire and Shane are in full-on boyfriend-girlfriend mode (it must be lurve!). Michael is no longer a ghost (as he was in the first book)—he’s a rock-n-roll vampire who’s dating the awesome goth chick, Eve. Love her. Claire is as brilliant as ever and is working for a mad scientist vamp. She’s learning lots, when she isn’t terrified that Myrnin might eat her.
One thing I really liked about this book was how easy it was to get sucked back into the story, even though I’d jumped ahead several books. Sure, things had happened that I was clueless about (Michael was a rock star? A crazy robot-vamp tried to kill Claire?) but that just made me want to go back and read the entire series. I also appreciated how the author didn’t go through a long recap of what happened in the previous novels; she just picked up where the story had left off and trusted her readers to catch up. But the story’s so well written, it was a snap to pick up and dive right into. I think, even if I hadn’t read a couple of these, it wouldn’t be too hard to figure out what was going on and enjoy the story.
Claire is a fantastic character. Even though I would have no desire to live in a town run by vamps, I wouldn’t mind having Claire as a friend and my backup in a fight. That girl can kick some serious booty, and she defends her friends to the death. Which is why I felt so bad for her when everyone in the town starts to lose their memories, going back three years. Three years ago, Claire wasn’t in Morganville. As the townspeople lose their memories, they forget about her and all the positive changes she helped implement. Things are returning to the way they were—which is very, very bad for the humans.
I also really liked the relationships in this book. For example, while Claire and Shane are teens in love (read: always kissing, hugging, and touching. Ah, to be young and in love!), it’s not a shallow relationship by any means. Their relationship started out as lust and attraction but, over time and all the trials they’ve been through, it developed into something more. There’s an undercurrent of support, trust, and friendship that runs deep and strong through their relationship. In fact, the same undercurrent is there between Claire and her other friends, Michael and Eve, too. It’s what allows them to survive and even (sort of) thrive in a town like Morganville. After returning to Morganville in GHOST TOWN, I remember why I liked this series so much.
Rating 4.75/5.0
This book is available from NAL. You can buy it here or here in e-format.