Do you like vampires, werewolves, angels, demons, and magic?
If you do, you've picked up the right book!
Elena Manory is by no means an ordinary teenage girl. Being born with the ability to heal herself from any injury, and with the knowledge that on her eighteenth birthday she will become a Vampire, Elena is aware that she is more than a little different from other girls her age.
It isn’t until she meets William Granville, an alluring and impossibly handsome vampire, that she begins to question her destiny and what secrets the Institute of Magical Intervention and her adopted family have withheld—secrets that could change the fates of not only her own life, but of the lives of all the immortals.
As events spiral out of control, William may be the only person Elena can place her trust in. He, and Elena’s magical family, must fight to save her, joining forces to defeat a common, deadly foe. For William, it is his chance to save the girl that he has searched eternity to find.
Excerpt
His howling pierced the night sky. I clasped my hands over my ears and tried to protect my face as the wolf sliced its talons through the car door, ripping it right off its hinges. He threw it high into the sky and it landed with a heavy crash on the timber fence, the posts splintering and tumbling to the ground like toothpicks.
I scrambled as quickly as I could over to the passenger seat, but the Vanator had taken hold of my ankle, his sharp claws pulling me roughly back the way I had come. My hands dragged through the shattered glass on the seat, spilling my blood all over the upholstery, as I looked for something to hold onto.
Professional Reviews
The Hunted
IN this modern celluloid world where vampires and werewolves are making huge dollars at the box-office, this author, Kristy Berridge, puts an original twist on these super-natural creatures.
The heroine in this highly-imaginative Aussie-based tale is a vampire – but she is something more. Elena was born with the gift of self-healing. She and her adoptive family, highly-respected members of the Protectors, routinely scour the region for Vanators (werewolves). There aren’t many in Queensland – most of them are based in Europe.
But Elena is turning of age, and she has met a man called William, who she fears but has a strange attraction to. Elena’s evolution as a young adult brings strange changes to her body and mind. Who were her birth parents? Why is she so protected? Who, or what, is she?
Mixed in with this fast-paced, intelligent and highly-entertaining novel, is a background of teenage girls along the coastline of Queensland going missing.
It is only when the story unfolds that the reader understands the connection between Elena, William, her adoptive family, the Protectors headquarters in Europe and the missing girls. The final chapters are climatic, desperate, chilling.
For a first novel, Berridge ticks all the boxes. She has the makings of a career author. To attempt what is now a well-worn theme and produce something fresh, vital and entertaining is the mark of an enterprising and crafted writer. May she write many more novels, in many more genres, to come.
- Wendy O’Hanlon
- Acres Australia
John Morrow's pick of the week
This novel sees the introduction of a bright, new and shiny author whose chosen genre is horror fiction. The first whiff of this is on the first page where we meet William who can smell the scent of human blood overlaid by cheap perfume and body odour at a beach party somewhere in Australia.
William is 500 years old and has gone through life trying to ignore the scent of that most sweet blood of all, human. He can also smell the scent of a Vanator, creatures born from the blood of vampires and mixed with werewolves, and who had given into their bloodlust centuries ago. After a quick scout around though, William is puzzled to learn that the creature did not stick around for this smorgasbord laid out before him.
Marianne and Thomas are twins as well as being two of William’s companions. They too as puzzled as William by the abrupt departure of the creature they could all smell. While watching the twins argue and snipe at each other, William had time to reflect on his time with Lucius Valerius, the Master Vampire. How naïve he had been thought William, he had been a young and impressionable man who believed and shared Lucius’s great vision of creating an army to protect vampires.
Centuries later, standing in the midst of a beach party, William’s thoughts were interrupted by the sight of a woman whom he instantly desired. Long rich brown hair framed a perfect face and complimented her knock-out figure. Even more amazing, her scent declared she was human.
Her name is Elena and she is not as human as she looks or smells. In fact, she hunts Vanators as well…………but what kind of creature is she?
This is a debut novel from a bright and bubbly young author. It is entertaining, quirky and has some wry touches of humour. It’s not all doom and gloom and certainly not a novel that will have you lying awake at night, cowering under your sheets from fear.
It is, however, an adventurous lightly romantic read that will appeal to teenagers and other devotees of the vampire horror genre. I also have a sneaking suspicion that Kristy is already working on a sequel to this one.
“When jaded 500 year old William, a Roman Guard turned vampire, spies Elena at a beach party, he has no idea how much his life vampire life is going to change…..after all, she is the first woman in nearly 300 years who has attracted his interest.”
Chris has been fostered at the Crowley boot camp since he turned seven. At sixteen, he is finally ready to run away because his foster father is an abusive person who works Chris and the other children to the point of exhaustion. All he has left of h
Chris has been fostered at the Crowley boot camp since he turned seven. At sixteen, he is finally ready to run away because his foster father is an abusive person who works Chris and the other children to the point of exhaustion. All he has left of h
