A Bite to Remember by Lynsay Sands

A Bite to Remember

by

Lynsay Sands

Rating

Mature

Fandom

vampires

 

Relationships
Vincent Argeneau/Jackie Morrisey

Characters

Vincent Argeneau

Jackie Morrisey

Tiny McGraw

Marguerite Argeneau

various side characters


Additional Tags

vampires 

romance 

Big Guy Named Tiny

Meddlesome Aunt

Mystery

Mind Control

Dubious Consent (not between main pairing)

Pedophile Vampire

age gap (cause vampires)

Series

Book 5 in the Argeneau series


Summary

Jackie Morrisey is a private detective hired to find the person who has been sabotaging Vincent Argeneau's company. But things grow more complicated when Jackie begins to see Vincent as more than just a client.

 

Stephy Thoughts

If I remember correctly, this was the first book I ever read in this series. And because of it, I refused to stop reading this series. I just really like Lynsay Sands' writing. She mixes angst, humor, action and romance really well and makes her books all enjoyable. And this book was no different. I also like that you can pick up any book in the series and it can stand on it's own as a simple paranormal romance. Reading the entire series in order gives you more, but, like I said, I think this was the first book I read in the series, and I wasn't lost or confused about what was going on, or who was who.

But enough about the series. I'm here to ramble about this book.

Lovely book. 

Characters are all fun and interesting. I like that Marguerite graduated from meddling mother to meddling aunt. I love Marguerite and her meddling, honestly. It's fun. Tiny is a massive trope. Big guy named Tiny that likes to cook? Yeah. That's a trope. But it's one I like, so no complaints from me. Jackie has some nice character growth. And Vincent is the right amount of brooding vampire that it doesn't become annoying. 

The spice is light. While there is some mild sex scenes, the book is more focused on the emotional side of the romance. 

All in all, great book. Great series. Great author. Highly recommend if you like paranormal romance.

 

Stephy Read A Quick Bite by Lynsay Sands

 Hello There!

First. I would like to formally apologize to Ryan for finishing this before finishing The Stand. As always when I read Stephen King, I needed something fluffy to break up the OH MY FUCKING GODS THIS IS HORRIBLE moments of terror. And I made a mistake. For the first two or three chapters of this book, I was switching off with The Stand. I would read a chapter of it, then a chapter of this. And then... This book sucked me in and it was all I read until I finished it... I am sorry. I will go back to the Stand now. 

“Birthdays could be such a bummer when you were older than the country you lived in.”

About/Summary

A Quick Bite is a paranormal romance written by Lynsay Sands. It was first published in 2005. And is the first in the Argeneau series of books. 

Lissiana Argeneau faints at the sight of blood. Which wouldn't be a problem, but she's a vampire. To help her with this, her mother kidnaps a psychologist. As one does.

Content/Trigger Warnings

Kidnapping

Sexual Content

Attempted murder

Blood

Mentions of mental abuse (not to or by the two main characters)

Characters

The main characters are Lissiana and Greg. And they are great. But the best character is Thomas. Love that boy. But this isn't Thomas's story, so I will refrain from gushing about how much I love him.

Lissianna is a vampire (or immortal). She has hemaphobia, and faints at the sight of blood. Vampires in this series drink from bagged blood, so that is quite the problem. She gets a job at a homeless shelter thinking she could feed from the people at the shelter, but that proves to be a bad idea. 

Greg is a psychologist who does a lot of work dealing with phobias. He is a workaholic whose family keeps trying to set him up with various women.

They were both solid characters. I really liked them.

A lot of characters that continue to show up throughout the series were introduced in this book. Most of them stick around for the entire book, a couple just show up for a chapter and then disappear. There are a few mortals in this book. Do not expect to ever see or hear from them again. They are unimportant.

Atmosphere/Setting

The book takes place in Canada. Toronto I wanna say... *looks at notes* Yep. Toronto. I did not have this in my notes. I looked on GoodReads.

Oh, and according to the first page, it takes place in November of 2000. Helpful. 

I didn't get much for either atmosphere or setting. 

Writing

I absolutely adore Lynsay Sands's writing. She puts, in my opinion, the right amount of humor in her books. I like a bit of humor in whatever I'm reading or watching. 

I do have one issue though... The phrase "she had curves in all the right places". I don't know why, but over the years I have grown to hate that phrase. It was used once in this book so I could roll my eyes and carry on. But gods, that phrase...

Plot

The plot is fun. Main plot is the romance. Or is the main plot the one with the attempted murder 🤔 Either way, fun plot. Well done with no plot holes. Though... What did happen to those dudes that tried to commit that murder... 🤔 Eh, I'm sure they're fine.

Romance

The romance is great. The series explains the instant love thing by saying all vampires have a Life Mate, someone they can't read or control. Which is cool. 

How diverse is it?

Not very. Just a bunch of straight, white Canadians really.

Overall Thoughts

This series is one of my favorite (if not my top favorite) series of books. This series is for sure my favorite romance books. I love these books. They are fun, easy reads with happy endings. I love how vampires were made in this series. It's different and interesting. I basically love everything about this book and the rest of the series. 

Don't pick this up expecting some masterpiece of literature. It's a fun romance novel. If you like fun romance novels with a good amount of humor, I highly recommend checking this book out.

I think that's all for this one. 

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 20

 

Twice Bitten by Lynsay Sands

An Argeneau Novel

This was not the book I had planned for T. I had a Star Wars book planned. Even started reading it, but got cranky for reasons I won't rant about here. So, I dug out another Argeneau book, cause they make me happy.

This book focuses on Elspeth Argeneau and Wyatt MacKay.

Elspeth moved to Canada to get away from her controlling mother. She rents a room from Meredith, a sweet old lady. Everything seems to be going well until Elspeth is stabbed and comes home to find her mother and younger twin sisters have invaded her home. Made that stabbing not the worst part of her day. Then she meets Wyatt, Meredith's grandson. The thing is, she's met Wyatt before. She just doesn't remember it. And then someone keeps trying to kill her. Things seem pretty shitty for Elspeth. But hey! She met her lifemate! Again...

I really liked Elspeth and Wyatt. Elspeth was a tough character but also caring and kind. Wyatt took everything calmly, which was refreshing. No panic about any of it. 

Also, G.G. is fantastic and I love him.

As always with this series, great read.

I didn't much like Martine (Elspeth's mother) for what she did, but I enjoyed seeing another side to the immortals. She wasn't evil. She didn't do what she did to hurt her children. She is just a long-lived woman who suffered a great loss and did not cope well. I don't agree with her choices, but it was interesting to read. 

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 19

 

Born to Bite by Lynsay Sands

An Argeneau Novel

This is a lovely story about Eshe and Armand meeting and falling in love. 

Oh. 

And figuring out who murdered Armand's previous three wives and his daughter-in-law. 

Soooo... A paranormal romantic murder mystery! Yay!

Eshe is a strong, bad-ass, smart, beautiful immortal and I am a little in love with her.

Armand is a bit broody, which... Understandable. Three of his wives have been murdered. But still likable. Also, he's a farmer, which was fun. I mean, a vampire is talking about birthing cows and cleaning stables. Fantastic.

Romance was good. Mystery was solid. Great book all around.

Oh!

And Bricker!

Yay Bricker!

I love you Bricker. At one point he acts as the Voice of Reason, but he did very good and we're all very proud of him.

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 12

 

Love Bites by Lynsay Sands

An Argeneau Novel

Going back quite a bit in the Argeneau series from the one I posted before. This is the second book in the series.

Love Bites is about how Etienne Argeneau meets Rachel Garrett and they fall in looooooove. Etienne is an immortal video game designer, Rachel a mortal coroner. When Rachel is fatally wounded trying to protect Etienne's maybe dead body, Etienne turns her. 

Rachel stays with Etienne while she learns how to deal with being an immortal, and of course, she falls in love. 

There are some other bits and hurdles, but no more spoilers. Go read the book. Read the entire series. It is one of my favorite paranormal romance series and I will always recommend it. 

Oh!

Another great part of this book?

Thomas!

Oh, Thomas, how I miss you when you're not around, you perfect Immortal cupid, you.

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 9

 

The Immortal Who Loved Me by Lynsay Sands

An Argeneau Novel

I'm surprised it took me this long to get a book from the Argeneau series in here. 

This is book... 24 in the series? 20? 19? I can't remember. Sorry. It's in the double digits though.

The book focuses on Sherry Carne -  a mortal - and Basil Argeneau - an immortal (don't call the old ones vampires, it makes them cranky).

As someone who has read the previous books, this was another exciting book in the series. And it concluded the underlying plot from the past few books nicely.

I can also say while reading the previous books is probably the best way to read these, it would be easy to read a random one and not be too lost. Lynsay Sands explains things that happened previously in a concise manner and doesn't info dump randomly. If something needs explained, it is usually done in conversations that make sense. 

Anyway!

Sherry and Basil!

Both are good characters with great personalities. Sherry has the appropriate misgivings at being thrust into this new world of immortals without being annoying about it.

Basil is caring and sweet. He doesn't have a BIG personality like some of the other characters, but I enjoyed his laid back ways. 

The plot twist was solid and well done.

But, most importantly...

Justin Bricker.

My two favorite characters in this series have been Thomas Argeneau and Justin Bricker since each of them were introduced. Thomas wasn't in this one (sad face) but Bricker was. I adored him being a little shit to Lucian sooooo much. And the whole other names for cock scene was priceless. Loved it.

Fantastic writing. Wonderful humor. All around a great book.