Uprising - Scott G Mariani

★★★

Read : March 2014

"For centuries, vampires walked the Earth undetected, feasting on humans in keeping with their ancient traditions, but now 21st Century technology has left them open to detection...
To establish order, the Vampire Federation is born, policed by special agents like vampire Alexandra Bishop, authorised to hunt down those who violate the new code. But rebel vampire Gabriel Stone doesn't play by the rules and declares war against the Federation, throwing Alex and her team into turmoil.
Oblivious to the chaos in the vampire world, human Detective Inspector Joel Solomon is drawn into an unlikely alliance with Alex when he investigates a series of gruesome corpses drained of their blood. Together they are plunged into a war of good versus evil, taking them from the streets of London to the mountains of Transylvania in a battle that threatens to destroy them all..."

Within Uprising we are allowed to enter the very exclusive and equally secretive world of the vampires. Evolving through the years and eventually establishing the Vampire Federation, they have learnt to live among the humans and to avoid detection at all costs. We follow Alex(andra), a hard-hitting, no-nonsense vampire Special Agent who works for the Federation and hunts down those that violate its rules and regulations. But not all of the vampire population agree with the Federation's new regime and the traditionalist vampires begin to show their revulsion. Finding an unlikely ally in human DI Joel, Alex and the Federation are forced into a battle of the new versus the traditional.

The first thing I noticed while reading Uprising was it's setting(s) within the UK. It's one of the very few fantasy/supernatural novel's that I've come across that have been set within my own Country. I did find a couple of the other locations a little obvious and cliche but it generally worked within the genre and the book.

At first, I found it quite hard to get into the book. The first half of the novel became a bit of an uphill struggle (maybe because it's not one of my favourite genres?) and it did take me quite a while to get through. Once I hit the 2nd half of the book however, that all changed. The story picked up a lot of pace and became quite gripping. It boasted a huge, action-packed ending which finished the book off well whilst leaving it open enough for a possible sequel.

I thought the characters within Mariani's novel were reasonably well rounded and relateable, I could understand the three main character's points of view and why they were taking the actions that they did. At times, I did find the book became a little cliche, especially some of the settings, but overall it didn't become too obvious and yet another rewrite of the traditional vampires that appear in novels such as Dracula.

I liked that Mariani approached the story from three very different angles and found it interesting how he told his tale through his three main characters, each holding a differing view of the vampire race and their place within the world in the 21st Century. Alex(andra), working for the Federation, represented the 'new age' of the vampire where all attempts are taken to blend in and walk among the humans; feeding on human blood only when essential and using state-of-the-art drugs so those you chose as your victims aren't infected and have no memory of anything having happening to them. Olivier represented the traditional vampires who were didn't want to conform to the Federation's laws and felt it was their right to act as they always had and as the creatures that they are; feasting on humans and their lifeblood and shunning all the rules and drugs developed by those they felt were diminishing their race. Joel came from the viewpoint of the humans, living in fear of these creatures that were evil to the core, preyed on the human race and needed to be extinguished before they could continue to do so.

Overall, it isn't a genre I find myself particularly drawn towards, and at points during the novel I did find things became a little cliche, but the story and characters were put together pretty well and I found myself enjoying it more than I had thought I would. I would recommend it to those who like reading fantasy/supernatural.