Vampires of El Norte

Beyond words. This was just so good from start to finish and I was blown away by the sheer brilliance of every aspect of this novel.

I do not even like horror stories. I tend to shun them as I am easily frightened. But this had me turning page after page in sheer awe.

The beauty of the writing made this a story about vampires that I WILL recommend to friends and family alike. The love story intertwined alternatingly had me yelling at the characters and crying when things went awry.

Desperately awaiting a third book from Isabel Cañas. Any wait is much too long...

Because without work and a distant goal, he did not know what else he was living for.

A smattering of beautiful prose and an incredibly unique take on the vampire myths, in the frame of a forbidden romance wrought with miscommunication. 

Unfortunately I don't think I was the target audience for this book. While some of the writing was genuinely poignant, the plot lagged behind, weighed down by chapters of misunderstanding, added to by one of the more frustrating MFCs I've read in a while. Her inability to see through any eyes but her own was infuriating and I slogged through the first 200 pages waiting for the horror I went into this expecting. 

This journey felt as if they were crawling through a nightmare together, a dream that tricked the helpless dreamer into thinking it had ended, only to twist in a new direction and gallop away.

we get our happy ending

He loved looking at her. He wanted her to be the last thing he ever saw, the first thing he ever saw, his heavens and his earth.

Instead of real growth, we get a flash in the pan event where Nena finally stands up to her parents, but we don't get the satisfaction of seeing her actually address their poor communication. I still don't know if Nestor was telling the truth or not about his sordid past that they'd quarreled over, since it is never again addressed. This is just one example of places where the story just trails without satisfying resolution,at least for me. And for goodness sake,the miscommunication!! The parents WERE RIGHT THERE to act as the space between Nena and Nestor, but nah let's just have Nena misunderstand or actively refuse logic again. Girl,you got some problems but you're 95% of them.

i wanted to love this but it really fell flat for me. i thought the main male character/love interest was really annoying and it felt like there were really no stakes in the relationship. the vampires were interesting and totally different than traditional vampires which was really cool. i also really like this author's writing and just feeling ok about this won't stop me from reading her future books

Good book. Kinda slow, but I liked the setting, themes, romance, and for me it had a great spin vampire lore compared to what I'm used to.

Great spooky read for October. Like a richly detailed historical romance with the suspense of a horror movie.

3.5 !

Concept is great - vampires vs cowboys! But there's not much time spent on either. Not enough horror to be horror, not enough romance to be a good romance. We're told again and again how much the leads love each other but never shown any actual chemistry. More time spent on the issues keeping them apart than making me care if they get together. 99% of all the tension in the “romance” would be resolved if they just talked for 5 seconds. I did really like all the implications that the white invading North American army were the true vampires.