Bloody Dawn

Aurora Ceades - or Freya at birth - is a Viking queen who has lost everyone in her family and has taken her First Commander as her king to rule by her side. After ten miscarriages Eric - her king - as ordered her dead. That night she awakes to find her First in Command standing by her bed, and barely makes it out alive. As she flees from her home and waits patiently for death to come, a man named Conlaoch offers her a chance at vengeance and immortality.

Now during Present day in the city of Chicago Illinois, we find the fearsome vampire fighting crime as the vixen "Nightmare." We find that she is special in the sense that she has wings and sunlight cannot hurt her: lucky vamp. We also find that she is the professor at a college under the name of Professor Aurora Ceades. We meet Alexander - Xander - Skinner and his friend Danny McLeod who both have a crush for the foreign professor.

One night Danny gets a call from Xander saying that hes is the DD for some pals on the football team and he wants some company. Tagging along the two find themselves in a club called Gargoyle, a club that is secretly thralling with vampires! When a vamp threatens their life, the two leave only to find them ambushed by an entire pack. Thinking that death is coming - or at least a strong beating - Nightmare comes to save the day.

After healing them Aurora finds that Xander has a birthmark in the exact same spot as hers and is the exact same shape and size. He is her msheekha: pronounced m-ske-ek-ah. The person who can save her damned soul.

The rest of the book is the telling of her struggle to remain not only alive but faithful to God and to keep her msheekha alive as well. There is a love twist with Aurora and Xander who both have their faith in God to help them along: Aurora's faith is a tad stronger having seen Jesus and believing his word. And in the end the happy ending all vampire books should have.

The story is written by Amanda Rose (the niece of a dear friend of mine) and is self published, meaning no editing. So there are indeed a few commas and quotation marks out of place but don't let it ruin your judgment. The book is heavily riddled with Christianity - the vampire believing in God and "doing his work" by protecting the meek - and has a strong sense in the fairytale believe that love conquers all.

The book gets a 3 out of 5 from me, and if you can ever find a copy I suggest you read it.