Jessica's Guide to Dating On The Dark Side

By Beth Fantaskey.

Jessica Packwood knows she got adopted from Romania. Her anthropologist parents were there investigating a vampire cult, and took a baby away before it was slaughtered in the purge. Of course, her parents say they were vampires, not in a cult, but Jessica's a practical sort and has never bought that. Until the first day of school, when new foreign exchange student Lucius Vladescu comes to live at her house (without notifying the Packwoods, btw). And he says he's a vampire and her fiance, promised when they were infants before their parents died. And they have to get married when Jessica turns 18, or else there will be a big ol' vampire war.

Jessica does not buy into this immediately. She thinks he's a hot nutjob. Plus Lucius comes off as a pompous, pretentious ass--and dealing with the joys of country life do not agree with him so much at first. Especially the part where the Packwood parents are vegans. Between that and the general snobbery and the insistence on a courtship even though Jessica think he's nuts-- and she's interested in a local boy-- it does not start well. Lucius's letters home to his uncle are hysterically funny.

"As you know, I have always been curious about our immortality...how it will feel to live on and on through time (assuming one avoids the stake, as I intend). I need speculate no longer. I have sampled eternity in Miss Campbell's fifth period "social studies" class. Three days on the concept of "manifest destiny," Vasile. THREE DAYS. I yearned to stand up, rip her lecture notes from her pallid hands, and scream, "Yes, America expanded westward! Is that not logical, given that Europeans settled on the eastern shore? What else were they to do? Advance vainly into the sea?"

However, after Lucius has a bad run-in with the abused horse he's trying to rehab, he finally realizes the niceness of the Packwood family-- and he starts to think that (a) maybe he's evil and doomed, like his horse, and (b) perhaps Jessica is just too nice to spend the rest of immortality among vampires. So he decides to back off of the courtship, back out of the engagement, and date the nastiest girl in school. The backing off, however, helps Jessica realize that Lucius isn't such a bad guy after all and is kind of sweet, country boy Jake is kind of dull, and...dammit, Faith the evil girl is just not royal material! (Yes, her vampire puberty is starting to kick in a little at this point.)

At this point, though, things start to get darker. Lucius's relatives are not happy with him backing out, and let's just say his life is at risk for it. But ever since Lucius figured out why his uncle was so insistent on the engagement, he's even more determined not to go there. Then Lucius gets outed, and a local mob starts to rise up...

I definitely enjoyed this story. It has more depth to it than you'd think. Four stars. Oh, and there's a followup novella that takes place between novels, if you'd like to check that out. After reading the book, of course.