Dhampir (Noble Dead, #1)

by Barb Hendee

Magiere has cultivated a reputation as the most formidable vampire slayer in the land. Villagers everywhere welcome her with both awe and dismay, grateful to her for removing the undead menace, but finding themselves poorer for their salvation.

Magiere has never had a problem with exploiting superstition for profit. Now, tired of this game, Magiere and her half-elf partner are ready to retire. But Magiere has attracted the attention of vampires who recognize her true identity - even if she does not - and who fear her birthright and latent power. They will do anything to stop Magiere from realising her true potential.

• ISBN10: 1841493643
• ISBN13: 9781841493640
• Publish Date: 20 January 2005 (first published 7 January 2003)
• Publish Status: Active
• Out of Print: 5 March 2021
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Orbit
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 448
• Language: English

Reviews

[mitabird]

4.5 stars

Dhampir was quite good. It starts off a little slow, but quickly picked up and became hard to put down. Magiere is a "vampire" hunter. What she is really doing is swindling villages out of their hard-earned cash. She, along with her half-elf partner, Leesil, set up schemes to make is seem as though these villages are being plagued by vampires and she is the only one qualified to rid them of these abominations. The vampire is really Leesil in disguise. After four years of playing this game, Magiere decides she had enough and wants to retire. Leesil is not too thrilled with this at first, but eventually agrees. She purchases a tavern in a town called Miiska and wishes to live out a peaceful existence. Little does she know that vampires do exist and some currently reside in Miiska.

What follows is a tale full of action, suspense, intrigue and some behind the scenes machinations. Magiere comes to find out that she is a Dhampir, half mortal, half vampire. She has the natural skills and talents to kill vampires, but it's not something she truly wishes to do. There's a man in the village who seems to know quite a bit about Dhampirs, but is not very forthcoming with the information. I felt for Magiere struggling to figure out what was going on with her, even though it was difficult for me to like her at first because she was a con artist. The vampires did not really appear evil and we do get to learn quite a bit about them. I liked them almost as much as Magiere and Leesil. This is a story that I would recommend.