Book review: No Such Thing as Immortality by Sarah Tranter

I will protect you until the day I die … forever!

A vampire does not have to feel any emotion not of his choosing. And Nathaniel Gray has spent two hundred years choosing not to feel. But when he accidentally runs Rowan Locke off the road, he is inexplicably flooded with everything she’s feeling, and that’s rage, and lots of it.

He is consumed with the need to protect Rowan at all costs including from himself. To Nate, what is happening is unthinkable and is pretty much as unbelievable as the existence of faeries. 

But you see, ‘There is no such thing as …immortality.’

No Such Thing as Immortality is an original take on the vampire trend; a romance written from the point of view of the male protagonist – the vampire Nathaniel. I enjoyed the twist in perception that reading from a male and vampire point of view gave and I loved that for the majority of the book it is the female lead, Rowan who makes Nate suffer!

There’s a lot of humour in the story and I enjoyed the way that Nate and his best friend James and sister Elizabeth bantered between themselves. As two hundred year old vampires they certainly have a lot of experience of vampire trends and myths and I liked that Tranter gave her own British twist to the folklore.

Nate is an interesting character and certainly ticks the boxes for a brooding, dark and handsome lead – having last being human in the Regency period and given his decision to keep himself to himself for the duration of his vampire existence, he seems quaintly unaware of current trends. With his country manor, Ridings and brooding demeanour there is certainly an air of Mr Darcy about him.

Rowan is a much harder character to pin down. As we encounter her, she is very angry and not just with Nate for running her off the road! As the accident forces a connection between them, Nate begins to experience Rowan’s feelings directly and his friends get on the case to investigate! It soon becomes clear that there is more to her and her past than even she knows. As the vampires reveal more about the mystery surrounding Rowan the book really took off for me. I found the first half a little slow but the second half of the novel is dramatic and action packed, really beginning to explore the fantasy word that Tranter has created.

The chemistry between Nate and Rowan is sparky and although I felt Nate had a tendency to be a little overbearing at times, because the story is told from his perspective, I found myself accepting the reasons for his actions.  Rowan’s reactions to his need to protect her made me smile – she certainly doesn’t make things easy for Nate or herself!

No Such Thing As Immortality is the first in a series that I think has huge potential. As the novel comes to a dramatic conclusion there are hints that the vampires might not be the only non-humans in existence and I’m really looking forward to finding out more about the paranormal world that Sarah Tranter has created and seeing where the story and Rowan and Nate’s relationship goes next.  An exciting debut!

3/5

No Such Thing as Immortality is released in paperback today and is also available in ebook formats. I’d like to thank publisher Choc Lit for sending me a review copy of this novel.

Find out more about Sarah Tranter and her writing at: http://www.sarahtranter.com/