A Review of "Overbite" [45]

Overbite by Meg Cabot
William Morrow, ISBN 978-0061735103

July 5, 2011, 288 pages

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Menna Harper has a gift..but not one everyone appreciates. Because she can tell people when, and how, they are going to die. It is not set in stone. People can change their lives, their circumstances, and sometimes avoid what Menna has foreseen. But it is not something that many people enjoy.

Not among those however is Meena's new employers, the Palatine Guard, a super secret demon hunting branch of the Vatican, who have hired her to work for their new branch office in lower Manhattan.

Because there were many things Menna Harper knew that her ex-boyfriend didn’t. Not only how people were going to die, or that demons and demon hunters weren’t just the stuff of fiction, but that there was, in every creature on earth, demon or not, a capacity for good and evil.

And that all it took to send any one of them over the edge was the tiniest of pushes.

Now, Menna does carry a bit of baggage with her in the person of her ex boyfriend, Lucien Antonescu, who inherited his title, The Prince of Darkness, from his father, Dracula. Yes, Vad the Impaler Dracula. But after their last run in, described in Cabot's previous book, Insatiable, Menna has sworn off relationships with vampires and is dedicated to her work in eradicating his kind. Ok, she is not totally in favor of eradicating them all. Maybe most, except for those, like Lucian, who she is convinced have enough goodness still in their souls to be able to be redeemed.

If Lucian has a good side, he might not be totally in touch with it, because Lucien has other ideas for Menna. His plan is to 'turn' her, make her like himself, and make her his princess. And Undead of course.

Now, I do not read vampire books. Demons, the undead and such, leave me cold.
Usually.

The Jersey Devil,
Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, January 1909.

But I must admit I really found this book quite entertaining. Cabot is a good writer, the story is pretty tight and fast moving. And quite amusing, which I did not expect, but always appreciate. And then there was the fact that south Jersey, my home, played an important role in the story.

"The Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey,” he explained, looking at Meena in the rear view mirror, “has long been considered a hellmouth, due to the fact that they are where the New  jersey Devil fled soon after its birth."

A Hellmouth? I have heard NJ called many thing, but not a Hellmouth! But there is a history. The Pinelands of south Jersey, a very large and most undeveloped area of bogs and countless pine trees, is said to be the home of the Jersey Devil. The story is that in 1735, a Mrs. Leeds, upset at giving birth to her 13^th child, cursed the child as she was giving birth and it was born a devil. With a tail, cloven hoves and wings, it flew off into the woodsof the Pinelands, where many claim to still see him to this day. My grandfather said he saw him once, but he was on his way home from a what I think was a poker gathering with some buddies at his boat house on the Mullica River and I always thought that a wee dram of  alcohol might have been involved in that particular sighting. But you never know....

Enough for personal memories..lol

If you read the first book in the series, Insatiable, I am sure you will love this one. But even if you did not, as I did not, I think you will still find this a fun, fast paced, demon laden thriller.

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My thanks to the publisher for providing a copy of this book to review.

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