Review - Bitten in Two (Jaz Parks, Book 7) by Jennifer Rardin (5/5 stars)

Reading level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Size: 336 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Release Date: November 8, 2010
ISBN-13: 978-0316043786
Stand Alone or Series: 7th book in Jaz Parks series, 8 books planned.
Source: Library
Rating: 5/5 stars


This is the 7th book in the Jaz Parks series, you do need to read previous book to understand what is going on in this book.  There will be eight books total in this series with the 8th book, The Deadliest Bite, being released in June 2011.  This book starts out a bit rough, but ends up being a very good addition to this series and resolves a lot of plot lines that were left hanging in the last book.

Jaz and crew are in Morocco on a mission to retrieve the tablet that can free Jaz from her possession by Lucifer's Assassin, Brude.  Unfortunately something has happened to Vayl and he now believes that he is living in the year 1700 something; as a result he doesn't recognize any of his crew for who they really are and thinks they are actually people from his past.  While Jaz and crew try to figure out how to fix Vayl, Jaz's possessions symptoms are starting to affect her physically and are making her increasingly ill.

This book starts out pretty horrible.  It jumps right into the story and, as the reader, you are totally confused.  Vayl is calling everyone with different names and I couldn't figure out when/why he had lost his memory.  It was really confusing, boring, and incredibly hard to get through the first fifty pages or so.  But, trust me, get through that part and you will absolutely adore the rest of the book.

Once you get past that beginning part there are fight scenes galore, wonderful humor, and many resolutions to plot threads that were left dangling in the last book.  Once Vayl gets back to himself the book gets even better; but I will admit some of the parts where Vayl thinks he is still living in the past are pretty darn funny.  Seriously this book had me laughing so hard at points I was almost in tears.  Astrid, the robo-cat, plays a pretty large role in things and she is absolutely-fricking hilarious. 

There is a lot more tension between the characters than in previous books.  Vayl kind of assigns everyone characters of people in his past and some of those don't agree with Jaz's crew (for example Vayl think Bergman is a little girl named Helena).  Cole and the demon have some romantic tension going on.  Bergman has romantic tension going on with the lady who owns the house they are staying in.  Jaz is having her heart ripped out everyone time Vayl sees her but can't recognize her.

We also get a lot of info about Vayl's past (since he is kind of living in the past).  We get to see the type of guy he was and some of the things he went through, this helps fill him out even more as a character.

Overall, despite a rough start, this book ended up being a wonderful addition to the series.  I thoroughly enjoyed it.  There are lots of awesome fight scenes, some romance, good character development, tons of humor, and many dangling plot points are resolved.  I am super excited to see how Rardin tied up this series and can't wait to read the last book in the series, The Deadliest Bite.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
- Speculative Fiction Reading Challenge Book List
- The 100+ Book Reading Challenge