Teresa Medeiros, After Midnight

After Midnight

Teresa Medeiros

Avon, Sep 2005, $6.99, 384 pp.

ISBN: 0060762993

In 1820 bookish Lady Caroline Cabot writes off the latest comments of her whimsical in the clouds youngest sister seventeen years old Portia of being overly dramatic as ever when she claimed their middle sister Vivienne is marrying a vampire. Normally she ignores her sibling's ramblings like the proclamation that a werewolf is sifting through the garbage. However, the pragmatic Caroline realizes her middle sister in town for the season with their Aunt Marietta has a suitor in London so she plans to travel there and meet this Viscount Adrian Kane.

In London Adrian invites Vivienne's sisters to join him for a midnight meal so they can become better acquainted though she has some doubts about the time in light of rumors about his nocturnal activity. To her chagrin from the first moment their eyes meet, Caroline feels hypnotized by the handsome viscount; to his shock he feels the same about the bookworm, but fears his feelings if known could harm his beloved. As they begin to fall in love, she begins to believe that her soulmate is a vampire. However, Caroline wonders if he is also a killer while also feeling guilty that she is stealing the man (make that male as a vampire is not a man are they?) courting her sibling's beau.

AFTER MIDNIGHT is a delightful tongue in cheek Regency vampire romance with quite a bite as the audience will wonder for quite a while whether he is or is not. The supernatural historical novel freshens up the sub-genre because the hero's falling in love endangers his beloved. Fans of both sub-genres will appreciate Teresa Medeiros's fine tale and look forward to the sisters' stories.

Harriet Klausner