Review: Dark Kiss – Michelle Rowen

Dark Kiss by Michelle Rowen
Series:  Nightwatchers #1
Release Date:  May 22, 2012
Publisher:  Harlequin Teen
Source:  NetGalley

I don’t do dangerous.  Smart, über-careful, ordinary Samantha-that’s me. But I just couldn’t pass up a surprise kiss from my number-one unattainable crush. A kiss that did something to me…something strange. Now I feel hungry all the time, but not for food. It’s like part of me is missing-and I don’t know if I can get it back. Then there’s Bishop. At first I thought he was just a street kid, but the secrets he’s keeping are as intense as his unearthly blue eyes. If he’s what I think he is, he may be the only one who can help me. But something terrifying is closing in, and the one chance Bishop and I have to stop it means losing everything I ever wanted and embracing the darkness inside me…. NIGHTWATCHERS When angels and demons must work together, something beyond evil is rising…

Reviewer’s Thoughts:
This is the first YA book that I’ve read by Michelle Rowen.  Being a big fan of her Living in Eden and Immortality Bites series, I decided to give Dark Kiss a try.  Sure it’s an angel story (which I’ve said before I’m not a huge fan of), but it looked intriguing.  I’ll say it now….I loved it.

Samantha is a teenager just trying to fit in.  Since her parents’ divorce, her father’s move to London and her one act of crying out for attention, she’s been trying to put her life back in order.  So, it’s under the guise of moving on that she goes to the all ages club with her best friend, Carly.  She just didn’t know that was a night that was going to change her forever.

Kissed by Stephen, the older boy she’s had a crush on, Samantha discovers that some in her has changed…drastically.  She’s ravenous with hunger, cold, catching the eyes of boys who would look at her twice before and really wanting to kiss Carly’s ex-boyfriend Colin.

Then she meet Bishop.  He’s confused and sounds like a stark raving lunatic, but something about him warms her and when they touch, she’s able to ease his confusion.  Unsure about the connection, but not willing to let go of it, Samantha helps Bishop on his mission to find the others and vowing to help find the source of the Grays…something she now is.  As she helps Bishop and his friends, she soon finds the need to question Stephen about what he did to her and discovers that so much more is happening which will test her loyalty to her family, her need for information and her loyalty to her friends.

A lot happens in this first entry into the Nightwatchers series.  Demons and Angels joining together to fight a demon who has gone bad (if demons can truly go bad), an Angel finding out his mission has been sabotage, but not sure to what lengths, and a teenage girl with an already fractured feeling of family discovering she’s not who she thought she was.

The storyline is fast-paced and grabs your attention from the very first page.  It’s a fresh take on the old Angel versus Demon story and I loved it.  The added twist to the story was not only Samantha and her true heritage, but also the relationship between Bishop and Kraven.

I can’t wait for the next installment in this series, hopefully we won’t have to wait too long.