The heroine, a born vampire half breed, has been plagued recently with visions and dreams of the president Abe Lincoln being in mortal danger...Ok. Weird But Ok. When she boards the boat to take her to Washington, the Union soldiers sink the boat in a battle and she and her best friend are marooned on a island. The hero, a detective in the presidents employ, is on the lead to an assassin who was on the Confederate boat that sunk. When his boat sinks as well, he finds himself stranded on the island with his prisoners. He instantly knows what sort of creature the heroine is, as he himself is a born half breed. But almost as soon as he puts her under custody, their small party of soldiers are attacked by hordes of newly turned vampires. This book was so all over the place. It was set during the end of the civil war but most of the dialogue between the characters was written with modern phrasing. The heroine is treated, not as a southern lady as she would have typically been, but instead she was treated like one of the guys. Now that didn't bother me too much because the hero did state that he's a believer women are equal citizens but I still want historical female characters to behave as they really would have in their time period. The dreams of walking with Lincoln that the heroine had was incredibly stupid and had no reason to be in the story as the army of rabid vampires took much of the focus. I did like the hero and heroine respectively. The hero started out as a cold, intensely focused man but was instantly smart enough to realize he needs the heroine's help during the battles. I didn't much care for the story after they left the island but I found the romance to be nice although a bit plain. I didn't like the typical portrayal of vampires, making them all zombie like monsters. And the fact the holy water hurts them and that the characters hide in the church wasn't my cup of tea. It was very original. ( )

3 ½ Stars

Bride of the Night is a paranormal romance set during The Civil War.

Our main characters Tara and Finn are both half-blood vampires (human mother, vampire father). Tara had never met anyone like her before, she suspected there were more of her kind but had never encountered one until the day she meets Finn.
Finn is a Pinkerton detective in charge of President Lincoln’s security, he knows others like him that also work for the president, but Tara is different, she doesn’t know much about their kind, what she knows is because she had discovered by herself. She doesn’t even know she has half-siblings.
At first Finn sees her as a treat to the president, he knows there is more to her or at least that’s what he wants to believe because of his attraction to her, attraction that is making him careless and forgetful, things he had never been. Circumstances throw them together in a place where they need to work close to each other to survive. After spending sometime together Finn realizes she is as devoted to the president as he is.
Tara finds Finn fascinating, it’s not just that he is the first one of her kind she has met but she admires his passion for his job and the president’s welfare.

I really liked Tara, she is sweet, caring and strong. I really liked her determination, she has an objective and does whatever is require of her to reach it.
Finn is dreamy, he is a “man” of principles and courage. What I liked the most about Finn was his ability to accept when he was mistaken.
They relationship developed slowly, their attraction was believable and hot.

The secondary characters are diverse and interesting. I really loved Tara’s best friend Richard and Tara’s almost step-dad Seminole Pete. But the one I loved was President Lincoln, he’s conversations with Tara were beautiful and inspiring, and I really would have loved to know more about him.
Even though I had some suspicions about the villain I can almost say he was a surprise, I really liked that twist in the story.

My final thought: Although Bride of the Night was an entertaining read I had some problems with it, it felt slow and a bit repetitive at times. The actions scenes were good but they became too much of the same and I wanted the story to move along a bit faster. After some stalling the pace picked up one third to the end and there Bride of the Night became a page turner difficult to put down.
What I found fascinating about this book is the way Mrs. Graham intermingles accurate historical events and details of the time with the paranormal aspects of the story; she writes them so well that they feel real and easy to believe. ( )

It was really good. It kept me wondering ... then it was never what i thought it would be... ( )