Devastations of Lust by L.H. Pritchard

I received a copy of Devastations of Lust by L. H. Pritchard in return for an honest review.

The blurb reads:
“No longer a place of putrid pleasure, but a place of devastation.” Vampires roam the streets unhindered.In their midst, the vampiric Seven Deadly Sins devour the life-force of their sin name-sake.But lurking in the shadows is a threat deadlier than Natural, Sin and human alike.With the disappearance of one of their own, it falls upon Lust to seek answers, find her companion and expose the veiled menace. All the while dealing with her own personal demons, making allies and enemies along the way.Will she have the strength to find her friend and stop the threat?

I was staring at the review draft for a couple of days, not sure which direction to go in. In fairness, I wasn’t entirely sure if I should publish it, because I feel the book has potential, but it doesn’t seem like a ready product.

The idea is interesting - there are two types of vampires: the standard vampire and Sin. The origins of Sins are not fully understood, they have some cool powers, but being one comes with limitations. For example, Sin can only feed on humans guilty of such sin; Lust can feed on those guilty of lust, and so on. The concept of Sin and the individualism of each of them is great and worth exploring in the next volumes. I particularly liked that the suitable blood tasted differently to each of them.

I cannot say that I liked the main character, but she was intriguing. During the story, she started to drop her mask of a tough woman and started to show her feelings towards others.

As much as I’m not a particular fan of the protagonists, I got curious about the mystery part. The cliffhangers are strategically placed, and they entice a reader to continue with the story, like the kidnapping of an individual at the end of one of the chapters, or one of the characters passing out just as he’s returned.

The thing that I didn’t like, and which made the book harder to read for me is the writing. It lacked flow, and instead of allowing me to enjoy the plot, it felt like I plodded through it frame-by-frame.

There are also a few occasional inconsistencies, which made me retrace my steps to re-read the lines - for example, this one:
“The sky was clear. Not a star in sight; there was just the dark, with a slightly dense atmosphere.”
If the sky was clear, where did the stars go? Light pollution? Even in the city centre a couple of brightest stars often can be visible. Clouds? If there were clouds, how could the sky be clear?

The author has a fascinating idea for the story, and it’s thought-out from what I experienced so far. I am acutely aware that I’m not the usual target audience of this genre, and this is purely my personal opinion about the book.
With that in mind, in its current form, I’d give it ★★★. However, I think that after polishing with a good copy editor, the rating could go up.

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