Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

**Contains Spoilers*** I was so very excited for the finale of the SVM series by Charlaine Harris. I had a 7 hour flight ahead of me, returning to Boston from London, and was ready to fill the entire flight time with saying goodbye to Sookie and finally accepting it was over. All I can say is this; Dead Ever After should have been titled, Dead on Arrival, A Southern Vampire Misery. Never would I have expected my favorite series to be ended in such an awful and incomplete way. Charlaine Harris really, really dropped the ball on this book. Books 11 and 12 were a bit lacking, but not enough to deter me from wanting to read the next installment. This book, however, made me want to weep for those few hours of my life I wasted reading and will never get back. My problem with this book is not necessarily Sookie's "HEA" choice, but with the author's complete and total disregard for the characters and world she had created. Charlaine Harris spent almost 14 years pulling us deeper and deeper into the world of Sookie Stackhouse. With each book the stakes got higher, making us feel that much closer to her characters. Each book had a pivotal moment when our hearts broke right along with Sookie, making us feel the emotions she so expertly brought out. Perhaps it was a huge Sookie moment, like when Bill admits his deceit and his true intentions for coming to Bon Temps. Or, perhaps it was a smaller, more intimate moment, when Eric stays by her side to help ease her pain after she is staked in Club Dead. No matter what was happening, readers of these books felt it deep within their souls. Dead Ever After had none of these moments...not one. This book read as though it was penned by a complete stranger. It is full of inconsistencies, distracting me to the point of wanting to pull out the 12 previous books to cross reference. Maybe Charlaine didn't have the time to double check her own story lines, but it feels more like she just didn't care. This book was not told by the Sookie we have come to know and love. I can not overlook her complete personality change, it just wasn't her. At only 338 pages, it feels rushed and completely reaching, as though the author was desperate to create some ridiculous mystery that would somehow bring all of her original characters back together. This book would have been infinitely better if she simply decided to focus on Sookie and her future life, versus trying to weave this convoluted tale. One of the hardest parts of this book for me to accept, and there are many, is how Sookie doesn't bat an eye at her thoughts regarding the cluviel door. She spent countless books going back and forth with Eric on how their blood bond was manipulating her feelings. She wasn't willing to admit how much she and Eric loved each other because she was too caught up in the bond. But, for the final book of the series, she seems pretty sure the cluviel door is the cause of her feelings for Sam, yet she just doesn't care? Where is her outrage? Where is her stubborn attitude? Where is her southern temper demanding to know how and why she feels this way? Sookie became a hypocrite, and settled for a man she has no chemistry with. She had more fireworks with Alcide and Quinn, but she settles for safe...not our Sookie at all. The character of Eric, besides Sookie, was probably Charlaine's most beloved. She spent 12 books developing his character, 12 books making his fans fall more and more in love with him, 12 books building his and Sookie's relationship. In comparison, it took Charlaine 3 books to reveal Bill's true nature. By the end of Club Dead, Bill has not only betrayed Sookie, but he also manages to rape her and almost kill her. Charlaine managed to destroy the character of Eric in about 10 pages. The Eric we grew to love would never have sat back with his hands tied; he would have plotted, schemed, and killed in order to avoid his arrangement with Freyda. The Eric from previous books put his life on the line to come to Sookie during Felipe's coupe, he put his life on the line to stand by Sookie in Rhodes while she held the soda can bomb, he protected her from every enemy she had...he loved her. I am heartbroken over Charlaine's choice to make him seem weak and disconnected. The series ended with almost no answers...and it's my opinion Charlaine did this to boost sales of the yet to be released Coda. I do not believe Charlaine anticipated such a negative reaction to her series finale, and was banking on everyone being desperate to find out what happens to our favorite Bon Temps residents. If she had provided a well written, well thought out book perhaps people wouldn't be this upset. I would be willing to bet she has major loss of sales revenue for her Coda because of her handling of Dead Ever After. I have read several times that we critics are acting entitled and just being sore losers because Sookie didn't live HEA with Eric, or Bill, or Alcide, etc.. Charlaine has received hate mail, death threats, all sorts of crazy responses, and while I do not condone this type of behavior, after all this is a piece of fiction, people have the right to be upset. I look at it like this; you have a favorite restaurant, it is simply the best food you've had. You go there all the time because you can't get enough of the best steak you've ever eaten. (apologies to the vegetarians out there, feel free to insert a meat free option, LOL) Sometimes you get a different waitress or bartender, you might not really like them, but you have to have that steak so you overlook this. Then, one day you order this amazing meal, your favorite waitress takes your order and smiles like everything is as it should be. When your meal arrives it is NOT what you ordered. The ingredients are wrong, the sauce is so bland you might as well be eating nothing, it is burned, and it looks as though an animal got to it first. It is simply unacceptable. Would you call over your favorite waitress and question what was put in front of you? Would you want to know why the ingredients were changed? Would you maybe even ask for your money back? Does this make you entitled? Does this make you a bad person for voicing how unhappy you are? No... but it might make you think twice before handing over your hard earned money again. Her upset fans are not entitled, we're just mourning the life and loss of our beloved Sookie.