A Review for Blood and Guitars by Heather Jensen

Posted by Guest Reviewer Melanie

Published Date: 1st May 2011

Finished Date: 29th November 2011

Source: For Review from Author

Format: Kindle

Pages: 358

The Blurb from Goodreads: When Aurora meets Trey, a famous singer and musician, she’s only hoping to get her fill of human blood for the week. The last thing Aurora expects is for Trey to make her feel alive for the first time since she was, well, alive. It begins with a casual painting lesson at her art studio, The Waking Moon, and quickly turns into a forbidden romance. Aurora is forced to hide her true identity from Trey, while keeping her relationship with the human a secret from other vampires in her Brood. Trey’s band is recording a new album and with Aurora as his muse, Trey is writing songs like never before. After being hired by their record label to paint the cover of the new album, Aurora has a legitimate reason for spending so much time with Trey and his band mates. Aurora can’t deny the unexpected connection she has with Trey, which is fueled by glimpses into his emotions every time they share a kiss. Caught between two worlds, Aurora must attend celebrity award shows and vampire rituals, find time to feed, and protect Trey from the dangers of the night, all while preserving her secrets.

The Review: Well, the above says it all really . . .  Aurora is a vampire, an artist. She is part of coven that is governed by an organisation called the Synod. She is quite happy with her life until she meets Trey in a bar one night. Trey is a super hot, talented singer and her first thought was that he would be her next meal but he intrigues her, she is drawn to him and feels like she wants to know him more but of course she can’t, because it’s against the rules. She puts all thoughts of him out of her head until he turns up unexpectedly and she finds herself agreeing to give him a painting lesson, things blossom from there as they inspire each other, bring out new creativity in each other and inevitably, fall in love. As Aurora tries to juggle both of her worlds, keep her identity safe from Trey and Trey safe from her world she finds that things don’t always go according to plan because they shouldn’t be together and the powers that be soon find out and give her the ultimatum, Leave Trey or he dies!

I must say I liked this book, it was a nice sweet love story with high stakes. Aurora and Trey were really nice characters both likable, nice individuals that came together to make a lovely couple. Aurora seemed to be plodding along quite happily in her own life, happy to own her own gallery that she personally stocked with art, that she made her living off selling. Her one vampire friend was male and had a thing for her but was happy just to be her companion and vice versa, until she met Trey. He brought out feelings that she hadn’t experienced for a while, made her remember what it was like to be a human again and gave her a fantastic opportunity to paint for his band. Trey had been suffering way to long with past relationship issues and writers block which could be disastrous for his band Catalyst as they begin work on the all-important second album, things seem to be getting to him until he meets Aurora. She inspires him and he starts writing again, working through his issues. Both making each other a better person/artist by falling in love and isn’t that what relationships are about? Being better people together than apart? It’s adorable and very sweet. Then we get a bit action in the form of the Synod, a vampire governing body that they fall on the wrong side of with devastating consequences, it was really quite sad and I teared up a bit (which happens rarely for me in a book).

I would have liked a bit more action throughout the whole of the book instead of just towards the end because I didn’t feel the threat until it was upon them, not a bad thing but it affected the pacing for me. I also felt that a couple of threats were set up but never acted on and thought they would have made for more mayhem. I don’t know if there is a sequel in the works but I would read it because there are lose ends for further story lines and I’m interested to learn what’s in store for them both and hoping for a bit more action now that the love connection has been made. Still, it was a good read with hopefully more to come.