Tomes of Shadowstalking

Welcome to the land of shadows, where evil is the greatest power, where nightfall marks the birth of terror, where your very soul is at risk. Join me as I investigate worlds filled with black magic and dark souls and encounter the monsters rule these wicked places.

This review does not represent the opinions of the general public. It reflects my personal thoughts and opinions on the book.

That said, on to the review!

The last thing Elena remembered was plunging into the river and dying...only somehow, she's awake and moving around. Thanks to the blood given to her by Stefan and Damon Salvatore--two feuding and competing vampire brothers--she's become a vampire herself, and just in time. Because there's another Power lurking in Fell's Church, and it reeks of cold, old, inhuman evil. An evil capable of turning all the dogs in town against their owners. An evil capable of conquering and controlling the elements with the force of its will. An evil capable of changing its shape. And its eyes are locked on Damon, Stefan, and Elena...especially Elena. Now it's up to the three vampires and Elena's friends--Matt, Bonnie, and Meredith--to stop the black Power that's preparing to savage and destroy Fell's Church and its inhabitants in the maw of its fearsome fangs. But can they find it when it's remained hidden for so long...and in time to save the town?

The third installment of The Vampire Diaries provides an interesting twist as a character killed off early on makes its return appearance. To be honest, though, there was never any substantial proof of the character's death, only Stefan's assumption. But the startling revelation provides an excellent sense of closure to this particular chapter of Elena's and Stefan's relationship.

The author does a good job of detailing the changes that occur in Elena when she awakens as a vampire. It isn't that she devotes an entire paragraph to it, but that she spreads it out over the course of several chapters, allowing us to discover it as Elena makes her own discoveries about herself. The realizations that she comes to about the differences and similarities between her two lives--one as a mortal, one as a vampire--flow naturally out of the situations she finds herself in, spending just enough time in the spotlight for the readers to acknowledge them before fading away before the plot. We also get to see her reactions to those discoveries, whether they are happy or sad, amazing or terrifying. Most of all, we see that Elena is still Elena at heart, and that her overall personality--as a leader and a Power in her own right--remains stable and mostly unchanged.

A YA novel like her other books, L.J. Smith's The Vampire Diaries--The Fury continues an eye-catching, attention riveting saga about the undead, the restless dead, and their interactions with the world of the living. Although it's rather conclusive--decidedly final, really--there are still questions left unanswered, waiting to whet your appetite...and you know they'll be answered someday, right?

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