Dead in the Family – Charlaine Harris

2010, 312 pages
Book 10 in the “Sookie Stackhouse” series.

*** SPOILER ALERT: contains spoilers to the previous 9 books in the series ***

After reading the previous 9 books in the series, plus the short stories collection “A Touch of Dead”, I am completely hooked on the series. I knew no matter what’s in this book, I’ll enjoy meeting all the well known characters again, like old friends, especially when the previous book ended when Sookie was finally with Eric, my favorite partner for her and my favorite male character in the series.
And it was nice meeting all these acquaintances again, I can’t say that I didn’t enjoy it, and I read through the whole book in a short time. But something was missing. It feels like the series lost its charm. It is not funny as it used to be. The romance is not as intense as in the first few books. The fantasy world does not have new fascinating aspects we didn’t know about. Same all same. The characters have changed and lost their uniqueness and fun. Eric is not that arrogance self-assured funny guy (OK, vampire) he used to be. Sookie is not as fun and funny as before, and her mind reading does not play a big part in this book. Even Jason is not that stupid and egoistic, and Claude that used to be charming just as long as he didn’t open his mouth does not seem like a total jerk anymore even after he starts speaking.
The plot is similar to those of the previous books – a body is found, somewhere near Sookie of course, what makes her involved if she wants or if she doesn’t want to, and she has to find out who and what, while, as usual, she finds herself in danger from some unnatural creature. I wasn’t disappointed by the plot, because the mystery was never the reason I liked these books so much – it was because of the characters, and the fun, and the humor, and the romance, and the imaginative fantasy world that was built in this series. And like I said before, all these were missing in this book.
I am not sure I will go on to the next book in the series. But who knows, once hooked, it is not so easy to let go…