Lover Enshrined - J.R. Ward

Lover Enshrined
J.R. Ward
New American Library
Copyright: 2008
9780451222725

From the cover of Lover Enshrined:

In the shadows of the night in Caldwell, New York, there’s a deadly war raging between vampires and their slayers. And there exists a secret band of brothers like no other—six vampire warriors, defenders of their race. And now, a dutiful twin must choose between two lives...

Fiercely loyal to the Black Dagger Brotherhood, Phury has sacrificed himself for the good of the race, becoming the male responsible for keeping the Brotherhood's bloodlines alive. As Primale of the Chosen, he is to father the sons and daughters who will ensure that the traditions of the race survive and that there are warriors to fight those who want all vampires extinguished.

As his first mate, the Chosen Cormia wants to win not only his body but his heart for herself- she sees the emotionally scarred male behind all his noble responsibility. But while the war with the Lessening Society grows more grim, and tragedy looms over the Brotherhood's mansion, Phury must decide between duty and love.

Lover Enshrined is the sixth book in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series. As such, it closes off this part of the series, but it's not the last book. Lover Avenged has just been released in hardcover, so there's plenty more to read. I say it closes off a part of the series because Phury was the last of the Brotherhood left unmated. From here on in, the story is obviously going to focus on the surrounding characters.

At the same time as Phury's problems are coming to a head, there are other major issues as well. John Matthews and the group of trainees around him are the other main storyline, well, that and the Omega.

He's really come up with the master plan, and it does explain some things about some of the characters. I don't want to say more though, for fear of spoiling the storyline.

I found the story a bit slow to start, although that may have been more due to the fact that I'd read the previous books more or less back-to-back, and needed a bit of a break. In fact, I read and finished the previous book I reviewed, Island In The Sea Of Time, after I'd read the first half of this book. Still, once I got back to Lover Enshrined, I found it keeping me up late again in order to finish it.

I've said it before, but I do like the vampires Ward has created as they seem to go against most of the typical vampire stereotypes. It makes for a refreshing read. Not only that, but there's plenty of story in each book as well. J.R. Ward makes absolutely certain that the reader gets plenty of book for their dollar, something I appreciate given the growing number of books with larger fonts and margins, especially as a fast reader.

The series so far:
Dark Lover
Lover Eternal
Lover Awakened
Lover Revealed
Lover Unbound
Lover Enshrined
Lover Avenged

Other vampire novels I've reviewed:
Blood Noir - Laurell K. Hamilton
Bone Crossed - Patricia Briggs