Moon Bayou

Sam Moon went to New Orleans. She had been hired to find Wendy, a missing girl who originally went to New Orleans with Habitat For Humanity to help build homes. She had been missing 6 weeks. Wendy also had a missing roommate, Angela Jenkins. Sam is a vampire and a private investigator. Sam had been set up and taken by some bad vampires. Wendy had become a vessel to the vampires. Sam had been sent back in time by voodoo. Sam loved her kids and cared about her boyfriend Kingsly.
She was physically and mentally strong. She had all the pluses of being a vampire, but managed to keep her humanity. When she was sent back in time, she was determined to get home no matter what. I enjoyed the plot, characters, twists and turns throughout the story. I highly recommend it to anyone that likes this genre.

An excellent first book in a spin off series. The authors have created in Samantha Moon the perfect female lead for a story set in New Orleans, a detective and a vampire...and there's some voodoo thrown in for good measure...but it is all used so effectively that the story moves along at the perfect pace to keep your interest piqued and reading straight through to the end...that's what I did anyway, I couldn't put it down until it was completed. I'm now anxiously awaiting the next book in the series...I'm totally hooked.

I really liked this book. It was fun and quirky, and a great vampire story that doesn’t get lost in the sea of vampire books. I can't wait to read more about Samantha.

Moon Bayou is the first book in the Samantha Moon Case Files series from bestselling authors J.R. Rain and Rod Kierkegaard, Jr. The series is a spin-off of J.R. Rain's popular Vampire for Hire series which also has Samantha Moon as its lead character and is a series that I have on my to-be-read list. Samantha Moon is a vampire who just happens to be a private investigator and a former federal agent. She's also got two kids and a boyfriend who's a werewolf shifter. Her latest case takes her to New Orleans but everything quickly gets out of hand when she's sent back more than two centuries by the descendant of voodoo queen Marie Laveau. Now she has to figure out who's draining women of their blood and find a way back to where she belongs before she's left with no other choice but to wait more than two hundred years to do so.

This being my introduction to Samantha Moon and having no previous knowledge of the original series, it read pretty well, though, being the reader that I am, I would have preferred to have gone through all the earlier books just to have more background on Sam and how she came to be a vampire and a private investigator. The story itself was intriguing, especially because what started as one case about a missing young woman quickly escalated into one that was more difficult to solve, especially since Sam didn't have the advantages she did in the twenty-first century. Add to that being a vampire with needs of her own and Sam certainly faces challenges but meets them head-on. I love that she's such a strong heroine and one who makes no apologies for who she is and what she's capable of. Sam Moon is one kickass vampire PI.

J.R. Rain and Rod Kierkegaard, Jr. combined forces to come up with a refreshing take on vampires. Now, please take note that I have NOT read any of the books in the Vampire for Hire series so my opinion is based solely on Moon Bayou. I was far from bored while reading this and certainly enjoyed the interspersed historical tidbits in the story. This does end on a cliffhanger (damn you, evil cliffhangers!), so I'm going to be keeping an eye out for the sequel. I also read a preview of another Rain-Kierkegaard collaboration entitled The Dead Detective and am itching to read that as well. ^.^ With a well-paced story and quirky characters, Moon Bayou was a novel that merged the past and the present with lots of mystery and suspense to hold my attention all throughout and leaves you craving for the next one. Four stars! ♥

Samantha Moon – P.I., mother, and vampire, returns. This time she’s headed for New Orleans, but not modern day NOLA where partying is the most strenuous activity going on. No, Sam is headed back to Civil War New Orleans, a place filled with voodoo, werewolves and of course, vampires. Sam seems a little more human, a little gentler in this book than in previous ones. I like the change

Samantha Moon has been hired for a missing person’s case by the missing person’s parents. The daughter was last seen in New Orleans. One of the first places she visits when she arrives in New Orleans is the police station to get an update on the case. She also finds out that there are two warring vampire factions, with one have a bounty on her head from 150 years ago. And, a couple people act like they know here when she has no idea who they are. Once she finds her missing person in the middle of this vampire war, she is hurdled back in time to the 1860s and a descendant of the voodoo queen Marie Laveau, where she starts finding the missing pieces of the puzzle of what’s going on. Will she make it back to her time, back to her children and boyfriend? Or will the people after her head finally succeed 150 years in the past?
Not one to be deterred by an offshoot of a series I haven’t read, I tried this first book in a new series written with a co-author. I enjoyed the protagonist, the plot, and the characters in this book a great deal, so much so that I can’t wait to read others in this series. The writing was engaging, the pacing fast without being too quick, and the descriptions of the surroundings enough to not be overwhelming. In fact, I normally don’t like reading books that take place in the past, but this book drew me in so much, and they did such a good job not making it too much like the past, I didn’t mind at all. If you are worried about not having read the previous series, please don’t be. I didn’t feel lost at all and want to (and will) go back and read the rest. Do yourself a favor and pick up this book!
Thanks to NetGalley and Curiosity Quills Press for the free e-book in exchange for an honest review. This same review will be posted to Goodreads.