The Care and Feeding of Stray Vampires (Half-Moon Hollow #1)

So glad that Jane Jameson’s town is being kept alive, and in this book you never know who you’ll run into! This one is about Iris Scanlon, who has a much-needed new business handling the daytime affairs and errands of her vampire clients. Doesn’t sound like she should run into any problems at all, right? Yeah, right. Her sister Gigi is 17 and so wonderfully snarky…I’m not sure that’s how Iris feels about it, though. This is a fun book in a town that seems made for trouble, and I look forward to whatever weird and wild things there are to come.

I cannot get enough of this author!!! This is the spin off series to the Jane Jamison Series. It starts with Iris, who despite having to raise her teenage sister, is managing pretty darn well in Half Moon Hollow. Iris runs her own business acting as daytime concierge to the vampire community. She does everything from pick up blood and essentials at the grocery store to planning weddings. As always, Molly Harper makes life just a little bit more realistic, and a lot funnier for her characters. Listening to Amanda Ronconni read these just makes the series so much more. I loved listening to Iris complain about the randomness of her customers needs, including one who has a prissy young girlfriend. It’s made a little funnier by the fact that Iris seems to be completely intimidated by vampires. She goes out of her way to be gone before sundown, almost never meets any of them face to face, and is mostly terrified of testing their resolve when it comes to not sucking her blood.

She’s delivering a routine welcome to the neighborhood thanks for being my client gift basket when she literally stumbles over a sick vampire. Cal has been poisoned, and is extremely weak. He talks Iris into taking him home with her, and keeping his presence a secret, so that whoever poisoned his blood supply can’t come back to finish him off. Iris is terrified to have him on her home with her teenage sister. Iris is hilariously spunky. When Cal makes moves as if to bite her in his addled state she actually bonks him in the nose, using how to fend off a shark as a reference. She’s quirky, and instead of alcohol turns to candy, which is hidden at strategic locations all throughout her home. With two kids myself, I feel as if I can learn from her haha. Candy in the freezer, candy behind books on the shelf, candy in drawers. My kids can’t eat it if they don’t find it!

Of course, hilarity ensues as the mismatched couple begin to fall for each other (sponge bath for a vomiting vampire with a hot body anyone?) and drama ensues as they work together to try to learn the identity of the culprit. Secondary characters are important in this series, and in this book they’re not neglected. The sister Gigi is fun and hilarious and well developed. We get a glimpse into the lives of past well loved characters, which is why I love reading books in a series.

Bottom line… this books is great, go read it! If you want the full effect, listen to it on audio.

This is the spin off book of Jane Jameson series. It’s about Iris Scanlon, the vampire concierge that helped to plan Jane’s wedding. She’s hilariously funny just like Jane and has the same quirky sense of humor. She is working like crazy to get her new company up and running while trying to keep the bills paid, food on the table and raise her seventeen year old sister.

When she goes to drop a contract off at a new clients house she never would have expected to find said client laying on the kitchen floor covered in blood. Nor would she have expected him to ask her to hide him because someone had tried to poison him. She rarely meets her clients face to face, preferring to meet their demands in the daytime while they are asleep after confirming over the phone or through email. When she does meet them after dark, it’s always in well lit, well populated places. Never at her house which by the way, none of her clients know where it is. But you know what they say, money talks and Iris needs the money.

Cletus Calix has been hired by the council to look into the bazaar vampire killings. His first day in Half Moon Hallow and he’s poisoned by lord knows what and finds himself in a compromising position. Someone is out to kill him and came very close to doing so. He must now rely on Iris to hide him and keep him safe while he gains his strength back. This isn’t something that he’s comfortable with but the more he gets to know Iris and pager little sister Gigi, the more he finds himself wanting to protect them and keep them both safe but he may have done just the opposite.

This book was just as funny as the Jane books. Iris is hilariously funny and I love the insults that she and Gigi throw at each other. Cal is so sweet and protective of both them and the way that jumped tight in to watch over Gigi and threaten Ben was priceless.

This book is the first book in the series but as I said before, it is a spin off. While Ms. Harper does a great job explaining how the friendships came about, I suggest that you read the other series first to get the whole effect. Trust me, you won’t regret it.

I love Half-moon Hollow. Seeing the characters involved and changing even after their story is done. The people are real will real problems. The two sisters in this one and I had quite a few moments when I was giggling (yes giggling) out loud to myself at the antics. Old vampire + sassy human = chaos! Include poisonings and you have a recipient for disaster. Another amazing addition to the series.

Iris, our heroine, is a very likeable character, entertaining an unlikely vampire guest in her house. The general mayhem and nicely portrayed world make this a very good book to kick back with, especially with all the characters coming nicely alive on the pages. Thoroughly recommended!

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