Laura's Review: The Black Dagger Brotherhood Series (So Far) by J.R. Ward

Wrath

Even if you don't like vampire books, but you like dramatic dark romances, this is the series for you! I didn't want to get into another vampire series because I have read so many already but these books kept on popping up on my recommendations and I finally just gave in and I absolutely love them!!!

Basic Summary:  This series takes place in Caldwell New York, where there is a huge turf war going on between Vampires and Lessers.  The Black Dagger Brotherhood consists of an elite group of Vampires that were created to protect their species from their enemy the lessers.  Since I'm only in book 5 and there are about 12 so far in the series I'm not going to go in detail about each book.  Basically each book deals with a member from the brotherhood or people connected to the group.  The first book lays the foundation for the entire series in that it introduces not to just to the characters but to the world these characters live in.

Rhage

What I love about this series:  I love this series because not only are these books really hot, but you get totally immersed into their world.  Not just their individual story lines but their religion, their traditions, their enemies, their lives.  By the end of book one you know pretty much how the brothers have lived through the centuries, what they believe in and what their main goal is.  Wrapped in all of this are individual love stories that just break your heart, and make it leap out of your chest into these stories.  Each one is very bitter sweet, and not only do you seem to respect these men but feel so so bad for them, living hundreds of years rough and abused until they are basically saved by these extraordinary female characters.  J.R. Ward hasn't just created plot lines for each of these books, she has created an entire world full of tradition, war, religion, politics, hierarchies, education, and love.  These books are so detailed and pull you so much, its like as a reader you become a part of this world.  Each book layers on more history for not just the individual brothers but for the entire Vampire world they live in.

       Book one introduces to Wrath, the only purebred vampire left and the king of their underworld.  He has rejected his role of king of centuries.  When one of his brothers is murdered it leaves a gaping hole in his heart along with a very vulnerable daughter left behind.  Beth has never met her father, and because of his gruesome murder by the lessers, she never will.  What doesn't know is that not only is her father a vampire, but she is in the middle of transition to becoming a vampire as well.  Wrath steps into to help Beth, while trying to hunt down the lessers who killed her father Darius, he falls in love with Beth and decides at the end to step and reclaim his position as king.

Zsadist

     Book two introduces to Rhage aka Hollywood, probably the most beautiful of the brotherhood.  He is nicked named Hollywood because he's so good looking he looks like he should be celebrity.  He comes across a human named Mary who needs the Brotherhood's protection from the lessers, all while accepting the fact that her cancer that she fought off years before has returned.  This book is very bitter sweet because at the moment that Rhage and Mary accept their love for each other, she immediately goes into organ failure and the years they might have had together very quickly become only days.  Mary is a very strong willed woman, making a life for herself helping people she comes across throughout her life.  She finds a boy, who cannot talk because he has no voice box and is practically homeless.  Little does Mary know the boy known as John Matthew is a actually a pretrans vampire (before transition to vampire) and has been taken in by the Brotherhood along with Mary.

Butch

Book three, which is probably my favorite so far introduces to probably the most messed up of the brothers, Zsadist.  Many of the brotherhood members are hundreds of years old, and by some cruel twist of fate Zsadist as a baby was taken away from his loving family and twin brother Phury and eventually forced to become a sex slave to a nasty mistress.  For 100 years Zsadist lives in a dungeon mostly chained down and raped thousands of times.  Because of this he is bitter, an animal sometimes and has a very very messed up view of the world.  His twin brother Phury was the one who rescued him but Zsadist lives with the scars of his past both physically and literally until he meets and rescues an aristocratic vampire named Bella.  Book three deals with the trials and tribulations of their relationship, wondering if Zsadist is even capable of love and finding a new way to live his depressing and very dark life.  Bella is the first of the females that has been raised in the vampire world, unlike Beth who is a vampire but grew up human.  She like all the females in this series a strong woman, who was tortured and abused by the lessers and finds solace in only Zsadist.  I think I loved this book the most because Zsadist seemed the most lost and messed up from all the brothers and I was anxious to find out if he could even have a normal loving relationship with a female because he is so crude and scary in the first two books.

I won't go into detail about the other books because there are so many, and I am sure once I have caught up with where the series is right now, with book 11 being released this year and book 12 being released some time next year I will write another review. I just wanted to give examples of how the books are organized.

Vishous

I truly love this series because its not just about the story lines and the impossible relationships that are intertwined throughout each book.  J.R. Ward has created an entire world and belief system with so much detail that is so complicated and woven throughout each story line that you want to believe this type of society exists.  The detail in these books very much reminds of Lord of the Rings, even though I have never read the books but from the movies you can tell that even though there is a main story line in each book or movie the world the author creates around is so detailed that you understand not just characters of these vampires but their beliefs, their issues, their loves and hates.  The traditions of the Brotherhood are steeped into every decision and action each brother makes, their worship of the Scribe Virgin (their god so to speak) is evident in every book and is the reason for their very creation.  There is a whole entire society created through the series, with kings, aristocrats, and civilians.  Almost an entire language has been created as while reading, By the end of book one you know who a hellren, shellan, and lheage mean and pivotal this new vocabulary is this society.

Rehvenge

A nice twist that always keeps the reader on his or hers toes is that each book is from several different people's point of view.  Usually although each story involves one brother more than the rest, it will have more than one brother's point of view giving you a sense of an outsiders reaction to the events going on. Other points of views usually include the lessers as well (the vampire's natural enemy).  Mr. X one of the higher lessers is prominent throughout the beginning of the series, and sometimes other lessers as well. You not only get a sense of what the enemy is thinking through their actions you actually know what they are all about.  To some people this might make you sympathize more with the enemy but to me it just makes me hate them even more.  J.R. Ward not only lays out vampire society but gives you the lesser world as well. You learn about the traditions and beliefs of the lessers, you learn about the Omega (their god) and how someone can become a lesser, and how they survive through their day to day life. You also learned how they are trained and educated, how they hunt, their tactics, their roles in the lesser society how they communicate with each other, how they recruit.  Its all woven so beautifully into these stories and layered upon in each book that you are sucked into these stories instantly.  Book 5 is the first book I have come across where the lessers POV is not included in the storyline and that's fine with me since I hate them so much and the author writes it as such that it doesn't take away form the story at all.

Phury

These books are written so well that when the characters are heart broken you are heart broken, when they are happy you can't help but smile while reading.  Each female character in the book isn't a typical whiny passive female character, they are all very strong willed from beginning to end and their journey with their loved ones are continued in each book.  You don't stop following them after the book is done because they are always around and their relationships are still being played out throughout the series.  Beth the Queen is probably my favorite because when she learns the truth about her father being a vampire and that he was recently killed your heart breaks for her.  When she goes into his room and she sees all these pictures of her throughout her life you really feel the immense loss she feels that she will never get to know her own father.  That it's comfort he died a warrior but so many missed opportunities are shown through her emotions in book one and sometimes carry onto the other books.  Although this society is very patriarchal, it is easy to see that Beth is Wrath's heart and life line, without her he would not survive.  She is the woman next to the man, not behind him.  With each book these huge, beautiful warriors reduced to rubble without the women they love and J.R Ward does such an amazing job of making these leading females strong warriors themselves.  

Tohrment

You really get a sense of the brotherhood and just how much each member truly means to each other.  Phury has sacrificed his leg for his twin, and his future for his brother Vishous.  It is so apparent that any these brothers would gladly die for each other, that they are so intertwined and connected that its so easy to feel as a reader.  When Darius, Beth's father is killed in the beginning of book one, the sense of loss is evident with each other brother.  You feel their pain so thoroughly as you read, you clearly imagine just how something like that could affect them all.  When Tohrment experiences his own loss you can almost taste his devastation and mourn for him as you read on.  J.R. Ward has created this tight inner circle and through her writing its impossible to not understand the relationships that exist not just between these men and their women but for their brothers in arms.