The beginning of the book was a little slow. It was a lot of seeing what was going on with each character emotionally. Many of the characters were plotting or trying to make hard decisions so it was not a lot of action for a while.

However after the event that made me cry (not going to say what but if you read it you will know what part I’m talking about), the action speed up. Once it got going, this book was impossible to put down. I think I read the second half in one night. The biggest part that drew me in was wondering what the heck was up with Kalona. Is he good? Is he bad? We saw hints of it before but now there is even more conflicting actions.

Story wise, I think the book seemed a little bit like it was setting up for something more intense to happen in the next book. Sometimes I’m bothered when books feel that way but this still held my attention and made me want more.

The one thing that bugged me while I was reading was the shift from first to third person perspective. I understood why the Casts wrote that way but it always took me a second to adjust so made the reading a bit bumpy.

Overall rating 4/5

Favorite Quote

“If it has tires or testicles, it’s gonna give you problems.”

In the House of Night novels, Nyx is the goddess that all the vampyres worship.  She is the goddess of night and has many different names and seems to show up across multiple religions.  Even the nuns that work at Street Cats believe that Nyx is just another name for the Virgin Mary.  To most characters in the series, Nyx is an obscure figure but to Zoey and a few other characters, she actually speaks and even occasionally appears.  She is also the one that gives the vampyres and fledglings gifts which she say she can never take back.

In Greek mythology, Nyx is a goddess that is the personfication of night.  Her name in Roman mythology is Nox.  Nyx came from the black void known as Chaos along with Erebus (as in the sons of Erebus in House of Night) and a few others, including Gaia, who became the mother of the titans.  Erebus is the personification of darkness.  Erebus and Nyx mated.  Their children included the personification of sky, day, Nemesis and Charon, the ferryman across the river Styx to Hades. 

It has been years and years since I’ve read Theogony by Hesiod so someone correct me if I get this wrong.  Nyx produced children asexually as well.  These included Doom, Fate and Death (sometimes written out as Fate of Death), Dreams, Blame, Woe, Hesperides (who guards a garden in the corner of the earth that we see in the Hercules myths), Age, Strife, Friendship, Deceit, and possibly some more that I forgot.  Wikipedia list some more that I can’t remember ever learning about in mythology so I’m not sure.  It also list her as mother of the hellhounds.  Not sure on that one.

Nyx, along with Erebus and most of her children are considered personification gods.   This is a statement true of many gods and goddess in mythology.  It is exactly what it sounds like.  They are an abstract like love, darkness, night, dreams, and so on put in human form.  An example of a non personification god would be Hades who is god of the underworld or Zeus, god of the gods.   Think about it this way, Nyx is consider to actually be night rather than the goddess of the night.

In many different myth, Nyx is seen as living in a cave often at the end of the ocean.  She is also sometimes seen as just being a dark mist.  Hmm, that sounds familar.  Zoey in the House of Night novels sometimes travels that same way. 

As for Greek religion, Nyx is persent but not really a main focus.  I’m not familar with their being any temples of Nyx.

Okay now to the modern.  NYX was the name of a comic that ran for a couple years that was an offspin from X-Men.  There was only a handful of issues made.  The comic has nothing to do with the Greek myth though.  NYX means New York District X.

Nyx is also the name of one of the bio weapons that shows up towards the end of the video game Resident Evil Outbreak.  Again, I don’t see any relation to Greek myths.

This last week I got to go see PC and Kirstin Cast, authors of the House of Night series at Powells in Portland.  First off, they are so funny.  It is awesome seeing a mother and daughter work together.  PC writes the story first then Kirstin edits.  PC had obviously been an author for some time but Kirstin is also starting to do some stuff on her own as well as working as an editor.

Okay, I’ll admit, I couldn’t help but ask about how many cats they had adopted from the shelter Street Cats that they talk about in the book.  I love the fact that they include both the shelter and a cat they got from there, Nala, in the book.  When I publish a book, I’m definately going to continue to give money to the West Columbia Gorge Humane Society, where I adopted by cat Temperance.

Most of the people there ask questions about the plot but there was some about writing and publishing.  A few people asked questions about why certain characters died or had other things happen to her.  PC kept saying that she cried and cried when certain characters died and some of them she just couldn’t part with so had to come up with new plots.  Some people acted confused about this answer but it made perfect sense to me.  When I write, I’m just conveying what I see and hear in my head.  I tried writing stories that I planned out the entire  thing first but it didn’t work.  I just have to write as it comes into my head and then edit later.  PC said it is like writing out a movie in her head.

Since I’m big into House of Night right now, I’ll have a few more post going up soon.  Watch for those.  Thanks everyone that reads my blog.  Love you guys!

First off, I find it very interesting that PC and Kirstin are a mother/daughter writing team.  Is there any other writing teams like that?  It was disappointing to read that PC did the entire first draft then Kirstin was more of just an editor.  Every interview I’ve read, that is how they say their writing process goes.  When they are here, I want to try to remember to ask how much say Kirstin has in where the series goes.  I get that she puts a youthful spin on things, but has she also changed the plot or made suggestions to her mom before PC writes out the first draft?

As for the series itself, I’m not completely sold on it right now.  It is weird because I do want to read more.  I find it interesting and I want to know what happens with the characters. I think I’m not into it yet because I haven’t found a favorite character.  There is characters I like, Aphrodite for example, but I have yet to really relate to one.  With Vampire Diaries, I love Damian.  In the Sookie Stackhouse novels, I love Sookies, and Eric, and Pam, and Sam, and Alcide…okay kind of everyone except Bill.  In the Twilight saga I loved most the Cullens. Edward was the exception to that.  In the Vegas Vampire book by Erin McCarthy, I loved every character.  Gwenna was my favorite because she reminded me of myself.  But with the House of Night novels, I just can’t find a character I’m really into.  I hope as I write books, people will love my characters.  I know I really love to the two main characters in the book I have finish and am editing.

One thing I like a lot about the House of Night novels is the way they pull together their own mythology about vampires and real Native American beliefs in general.  The prayers and nature ties are interesting.  I think it is a really cool spin on fantasy novels.  I just started reading Moon Called by Patricia Briggs and realized almost immediately, it is going to be a similar meeting of made of supernatural myths and real life Native ones.  Oh and why  did no one tell me sooner that all the Mercy Thompson books took place in Finley, Washington?  I have actually driven past there many times. 

Overall, I did enjoy reading Marked and Betrayed.  I’m sure in the next month or so I will get completely caught up with the series.  I’ll try to write a blog about seeing PC and Kirstin in a few days  and then another one when I’m done with the series.