Red Moon Rising (ARC)

Author: Peter Moore
Genre: Young-Adult - Paranormal

Publication Date: February 8, 2011
Age Range: Young-Adult
Pages: 336
Date Scoot Read: January 2011
Source: ARC from Different Area Codes Book Tour

Scoot's Rating: 6- Good read with small flaws.

Synopsis (via Goodreads): Being only half-vamp in a high school like Carpathia Night makes you a whole loser. But Danny Gray manages to escape the worst of the specists at his school. Thanks to genetic treatments he had as an infant, most people assume Danny's other half is human. Which is a good thing.

Ever since the development of synthetic blood – SynHeme – vamps have become society’s elite, while wulves like his father work menial jobs and live in bad neighborhoods. Wulves are less than second class citizens; once a month they become inmates, forced to undergo their Change in dangerous government compounds.

For Danny, living with his vamp mother and going to a school with a nearly all-vamp student body, it’s best to pretend his wulf half doesn’t even exist. But lately Danny's been having some weird symptoms -- fantastic night vision; a keener-than-usual sense of smell; and headaches, right around the full moon.

Even though it's easy to be in denial, it's hard to ignore evidence. There's only a month until the next few moon, and Danny's time is running out.

Peter Moore speaks to adolescents in a voice that will have them laughing, set in a world that will get them thinking.

Scoot’s Review:
Imagine the US Civil Rights Movement era (post integration).  Now replace skin color/race for species prejudice and you have the world of Red Moon Rising.  Along with a half vamp-half wulf teen coming of age story, the resounding theme of this novel is prejudice.  Vampires are the elite; smart, rich, and beautiful. Wulves are the bottom of the barrel; “deformed”, grungy and poor. Humans are somewhere in between the two; usually attempting to emulate the Vamps.  The schools, despite their different schedules between day and night, are integrated, but no one is too happy about it and there are obvious clicks.  The story follows Dante (aka – Danny) Gray who is half Vamp and half Wulf.  Danny is getting older and his world flips upside down when his Wulf side starts to show in unexpected ways.  Terrified of changing on the next full moon it is a race against time to discover just how much of a Wulf he really is.  On top of all that, Danny is dealing with prejudice at school and his first real crush starting to notice him.  What is an overwhelmed teen to do?  The story was interesting and a quick read, but at times it dragged and I got a little tired of hearing about the speciest problems.  I enjoyed Danny’s banter and attempts at humor even in stressful situations.   I also liked the realistic action and ‘grittiness’ of the Wulf traits, but I would have been happier if it focused more on that than going off on other tangents.  There is some romance, but it is not the main storyline. From the ending this story looks to be the first in a series.