The Birth of Jaiden by Jennifer Malone Wright

Author Summary: Long ago, a prophecy was foreseen. A child would be born, a child who held the power to destroy the world. Now, it is up to Alexander Lucas, a one-hundred-year vampire, to keep the baby girl safe from his arch enemy Malcolm.
In order to save her, Alexander must raise the child as his own. Will he be able to resist his vampire tendencies to care for a human baby? With the help of the wisest of the supernatural, an organization called The Great council, Alexander must face many battles to ensure the safety of this very special child.

My Take: I don’t think that I have ever struggled with a review as much as I am with this one! Ahhhh!!! I can’t even decide how I feel about The Birth of Jaiden! Or even how I would rate it!!

OK...I've decided! I actually REALLY liked this book, Jennifer has created an amazing fantasy novel (a guilty pleasure...shhh, don't tell anyone LOL). The writing was a little choppy but the story kept me entertained enough to not let it bother me. While reading there was never a time that I wanted to put the book down (unless my obligations required me...boo! for obligations) or I never felt like there was unnecessary detail.

I do want to say that this book is unlike any other book that I have read. First, the storyline and content of this book were completely unexpected! Second, I normally read YA books and the reason I do is because the majority of Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance books that are considered adult these days would, in my mind, be categorized as Erotica novels. I’m not a fan of Erotica books. This book is not for a young adult audience, but it is not because it has detailed sex scenes.

Do you like True Blood? Then you would probably like this book. I read the first book and then half of the second book of the Sookie Stackhouse series, and those books were a little boring to me. But the True Blood TV series was totally not boring! Based on what I did read in Sookie Stackhouse, I don’t remember the brutal parts as being very vivid or graphic, UNLIKE the TV series. So when I say do you like True Blood, I am not asking if you like Sookie Stackhouse!

Basically, what I am getting at here is that, for me, The Birth of Jaiden has some pretty horrific scenes. Normally, when I read a book that has anything that disturbs me mentally, I just CANNOT handle it. But, for some reason I don’t have that problem with this book. For example, I got to a scene in the book where 3 men hurt a girl, and then Alex goes looking for the men. When he finds the men, they are obviously goners and he “sees” what they did to the girl while he is sucking one of the men dry of all his blood. When the description comes, I winced thinking, “Oh, no! I don’t think this book is going to work.” But then it ended up not disturbing me as much as I thought it might. I’m not sure if that’s because Jennifer Malone-Wright refrained from including major graphic details, leaving those details to the imagination of the reader, or because of some other reason that I can’t put my finger on!

I was talking to a co-worker about my conflictions, and she asked me, “If the scenes that are horrific were left out, would you like the book more?” And that really got me thinking! I said, “No, because I think those scenes actually made the book even better.” It is truly bizarre that I feel this way, but I don’t want Jennifer Malone-Wright to change them!

Jennifer also does a really nice job developing her characters. Each character is developed more fully as the story unfolds, and Jennifer includes the story of the character’s past life at just the right time and in just the right place. Primarily, the story follows the main character, Alex, but Jennifer does really well changing scenes to other character’s points-of-view at just the right time to keep you entertained and informed, and to keep the story flowing.

In the book, everyone in The Great Council was concerned about Malcolm and worried about the destruction that he might cause. But I kept thinking, “He isn’t the problem, the real whack job of the story is his twisted, freaky wife!” It really disturbs me to think that Levine (Malcolm’s wife) is probably one of my favorite characters. Her character is so evil (on a level that I could never imagine) that I just seem to have a hard time not thinking about her whenever I think about this book!

Another fave character of mine is Deanna. When her character is introduced, I saw her as a timid, quiet character who, later in the story, really surprises me. She comes forward with some amazing ideas on how to defeat Malcolm and then she takes the initiative to carry out her plan. At that point I saw a hot heroine and I started thinking, "I love this chick!"

I did find some strange clichés in this book. The main character is a vampire who sleeps in a coffin, but EVERY night he breaks into a church to pray AND he has a guardian angel?! Also, there is so much that is sick, evil and wicked in this book but then God still plays such a big part in the “plan” that The Great Council follows.

This book has an true ending, so you can be content with it being a stand-alone novel; however, Jennifer does leave some things open to allow the story to become a series.

Even though I really struggled with this review, I could still talk about this book for hours because it had me thinking so much! So, I will just leave it at this . . . I never had such a feeling that I might just have to come back here to change or add to my review!


Buy on Amazon:
The Birth of Jaiden (Paperback)
The Birth of Jaiden (Kindle Edition)
Buy on BN.com:
The Birth of Jaiden (Paperback)