Book Review: Deception

Title: Deception

Author: Stacy Claflin

Date: 2012

Quote: "I glanced over at my used, hard-earned Ford. It languished next to the glistening BMW. POP! POP! POP! Three of the six driveway lights exploded." 

You'd think Alexis would be past the moody stage of adolescence by now; even baby sister Natalie, in grade ten, ought to be mellowing. Alexis didn't give their parents time to buy her a car, though they could afford one. She worked and bought her own. And their mother might like to make Alexis as much of a fashion plate as Natalie is, but Alexis never has paid any attention to what she wears. And suddenly, though she's almost done with high school, Alexis feels so envious of Natalie, anyway, that her anger makes nearby light bulbs explode. Alexis just knows she's adopted and their parents love their own natural-born daughter more.

The plot thickens when Alexis checks her DNA and finds that she's not related to her parents. Then some trusted friends tell her what sounds like the classic teen-angst fantasy: Alexis's parents have had their memories magically altered so that they think she's their daughter, but actually she's a European princess in their foster care. But...European royalty are sickly and inbred and not even good-lookng, aren't they? Well, yes. Alexis is a vampire princess. The mood swings of puberty are nothing to the mood swings Alexis is scheduled to suffer this winter. Ordinary vampires are made, not born, by having a crucial amount of blood drained out of them by an existing vampire and biting that vampire back, as in the canon of vampire fiction; but vampire royalty are for all practical purposes human up to about age eighteen, and then their vampire super-powers grow in and their mood swings justify locking them up, just as if they'd been humans who seriously believed they were vampires.

Alexis is an all-American brat. No wariness about her new powers or compunctions about getting them right, for her! Alexis talks back. When locked up she uses her power to walk through walls and gets on with exploring her powers all by herself, though warned that as a princess she's "stronger" than other vampires. Alexis be like, "How many rival vampires can I kill?"

The one check on her amoral hedonism is Cliff, the vampire prince to whom she's betrothed. They're old childhood friends. They're "in love." However, when Alexis craves blood, she's heard of a human boy who willingly gave blood to another vampire girl. One day, after biting him, she kisses him. That's cheating on Cliff. Cliff goes off in a royal sulk, which of course only gives Alexis more time and motivation to build a romantic relationship with her willing victim, Tanner. Even her vampire mentor Clara only sighs at the vagaries of fate, that Alexis should be simultaneously in love with two good men.

Vampire lore started with a real-world horror--people used occasionally to be buried while they were only in comas, after which some of them clawed their way out of their coffins looking ghastly and feeling worse. Vampire lore is popular, however, because vampires are idealized embodiments of the human id. They're not going to Heaven in any case so they don't have to bother about behaving like people who are going to Heaven. They can seduce anyone they fancy, do with their victims as they please, and while they're about it take all the wealth and worldly power they fancy, too. Their behavior can be appalling. Why not? People are appalled by them anyway.

Alexis' parents apologize for not having given her a second car, sooner, by buying Alexis a Lexus. Alexis thinks the pun is cute but she's not going to stay with them or finish the year at school anyway. Vampires don't do loyalty. Alexis has improbably committed young men to betray and people--vampires and humans--to kill. 

Is this plot amusing? Do you want to be a person who finds it amusing? Alexis' tale is well told but I feel the need for an extra shower after having read it.