Audiobook Review - Biting Cold (Chicagoland Vampires, Book 6) by Chloe Neill (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Size: 352 pages
Publisher: NAL Trade
Release Date: August 7, 2012
ISBN: 978-0451237019
Stand Alone or Series: 6th book in the Chicagoland Vampires series
Source: Audiobook from Audible.com
Rating: 4/5 stars

I listened to this book on audiobook and have a lot to say about the new narrator (not positive). Anyway this is the sixth book in the Chicagoland Vampires series and it was a solid continuation of the series.

I need to comment on the narrator change in this audiobook first. The narrator change was horrible; all the characters fail to sound like themselves and all the voices for male characters sound the same. Merit sounds much drier and less emotional than in previous books; like a pale ghost of her fiery self. Why did they have to switch narrators? If they keep this narrator for future books I will no longer be listening to these on audiobooks. Such a disappointment; these were such great audiobooks....

This book follows up on a lot of issues that started in the last book. Ethan is dealing with Mal being stuck in his head and Ethan and Merit are trying to cobble together a new relationship. Things get even worse when Tate consumes all the evil in the world and goes rogue. Ethan's house is also under investigation by the vampire GP and they are threatening to kick the house out of the GP. So a lot is going on and it is up to Merit to deal with it all.

Merit and Ethan continue to have an on again, off again type of relationship and this drove me crazy. I wish they would just decide what they want and get on with the story. That being said there are some very good scenes between the two.

Mal is trying to kick her addiction to black magic. I am not sure how I feel about the whole Mal storyline; it is so sad to see her degraded from the sparkly and happy person she was earlier in the series. She makes some progress in this book to kicking her black magic addiction, but not a ton. It will be interesting to see how this storyline goes.

It was incredibly interesting to finally have the Tate storyline expanded on. We learn a ton about what Tate is and his history and that was fascinating.

We also finally get some incredibly interesting resolution around Cadogan’s status as a House. I am hoping that we can finally move past this whole political issue and get on to a different storyline.

These books are a bit hard to review because they are so connected to each other. You definitely need to read previous books in the series or you will be totally lost. There are a lot of little storylines going on here and because of that the story progresses, but slowly.

I still enjoyed the story and hope that the Ethan/Merit drama can be set aside for a while in the next book. The ending was exciting and I am eager to see how some of Cadogan Houses’s decisions play out in the next book. The book ends on a very positive note; which was nice to finally have happen in this series.

Overall I enjoyed this addition to the series. We get some resolution around the Mallory issue and around Ethan/Merit. This book ties up a lot of things and sets up some interesting new storylines. The ending is spectacular and I am eager to see where the series goes next. This was a bit of a transition novel and it tidies up a lot of the loose ends from the last couple books. I definitely recommend this series to fans of vampire urban fantasy.

This book goes towards the following reading reviews:
- Horror and Urban Fantasy Challenge
- 150+ Books Reading Challenge