Review – Cold Reign (Jane Yellowrock, Book 11) by Faith Hunter (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Length: 384 pages
Publisher: Ace
Release Date: May 2, 2017
ISBN-13: 978-1101991404
Stand Alone or Series: 11th book in the Jane Yellowrock series
Source: eGalley from NetGalley.com
Rating: 4/5 stars

“Jane walks softly and carries a big stake to keep the peace in New Orleans, all part of her job as official Enforcer to Leo Pellissier, Master of the City. But Leo’s reign is being threatened by a visit from a delegation of ancient European vampires seeking to expand their dominions.

And there’s another danger to the city. When she hears reports of revenant vampires, loose in NOLA and out for blood, Jane goes to put them down—and discovers there’s something unusual about these revenants. They never should have risen.

Jane must test her strength against a deadly, unnatural magic beyond human understanding, and a ruthless cadre of near-immortals whose thirst for power knows no bounds…”

I got this book through NetGalley to review. This is the 11th book in the Jane Yellowrock series. I haven’t enjoyed the last couple books in this series as much as the previous ones. The books are long and when I read them, instead of whipping through them, they feel long to me.

I think there’s been too much focus on all the political issues going on with the European vampires, I haven’t been enjoying this plot thread a ton. Additionally tons of new characters are thrown at the reader each book because of all the new players arriving in New Orleans as part of this story. It’s hard to read and hard to keep track of everyone.

There ends up being so much packed into the story that it feels frantic and a bit disorganized at time. Jane just runs frantically from one place to the next and very little time is spent on further developing her character. We also don’t get as much time watching her interact with those around her in a non-frantic setting and I miss that.

I still do continue to enjoy a lot of the characters in this book. The progress in understanding Jane’s skinwalker abilities and unraveling the magics within her was interesting. I also did enjoy some of the revelations about Bruiser and his developing powers.

I think the story may just be getting a bit too drawn out and complex. It feels like the book could have used better editing. I don’t know…I’ve just been struggling to stay interested for the whole story; these are pretty long books and they are starting to feel very long to me. Don’t get me wrong they are still well written and full of fabulous action scenes and characters; they just feel…long, and not in a good way.

Overall not my favorite book in the Jane Yellowrock series. The last few books have just felt very long to me and overly disorganized and complex. We are getting too many new characters thrown at us and the book pace comes off as almost frantic. I’ll read the next book in the series but if that one is similar to the last couple, I think I am done with the series. I would still recommend the series to urban fantasy fans; most of it has been amazing…it’s just these last couple books that have been disappointing for me.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge
– New Release Reading Challenge
– Flights of Fantasy Reading Challenge
– Paranormal Reading Challenge