"Dead in the Family” Hits Shelves May 4

A Book Reviewer from Wilmington, North Carolina’s Star News Online received his advanced copy of Charlaine Harris‘ “Dead in the Family” this week. For those of you who have been faithfully reading Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse series, this is the long-awaited tenth book. Harris’ blog acknowledges that the book has an underlying theme of family and specifically refers to those of Sam, Sookie, Eric, and Bill. The Star News Book Reviewer makes no note of the family theme, but he does give a general plot summary. I will try not to regurgitate too much here, but if you have not yet read this far in the book series, you may want to stop now.

Apparently Harris has Sookie mourning the loss of both her beloved Fairy Godmother, Claudine, who was killed during the Fairy War in “Dead and Gone“, and her grandfather, who has returned to the Fairy World permanently. Sookie attempts to make amends with Eric, and their struggle with defining their complicated relationship continues (Sookie inadvertently symbolically “married” Eric in the last book). In the biggest hint yet at what the book holds, the Reviewer notes that at least one of the Fairies did not return to the Fairy World and continues to exist in the Human World for the purpose of seeking revenge on Sookie. I see another mystery in readers’ futures!

This Reviewer’s preview certainly whets the appetites of those of us eagerly awaiting Sookie’s next adventure. Given Harris’ blog post and lack of detail in either her notes or the Book Reviewer’s, I still wonder what will transpire between Sookie and Eric, Sookie and Bill, Sam, and Jason. Will Sookie’s discontentment with Alcide resolve (I can’t help but want her with him, though Harris seemed to dash that hope in the last few books!) Harris claims she had “big plans” for several characters but did not want to cram everything into this book and is holding some back for the next – giving fans more reasons to devour “Dead in the Family” and start awaiting the next. Fortunately, we have True Blood to tide us over in the interim!