The Slither Queen by Tamera Lawrence; A Slithering Sizzling Scintillating Success
By Julie Sara Porter
Bookworm Reviews
Spoilers: I suppose there are worse things to turn into than a serpent. You would be on the shortlist to play The Serpent in an adaptation of The Garden of Eden. You would be yelled at by Samuel L. Jackson in one of his meme-tastic roles. You would be coldblooded all year round especially in the hot summertime. At the very least, you would strike fear into the hearts of anyone with ophidiophobia and would look really awesome doing it. The Slither Queen by Tamera Lawrence is about a group of Shifters who can transform into such creatures in a novel that is slivering, scintillating, and sizzling.
Blake Howard, a conniving and ruthless leader of a serpent cult has kidnapped his newborn daughter, Prisca and her mother, Lustra so Prisca can be used in a ritual. But what Blake doesn't know is that Prisca has stronger abilities than he is aware of. One of these is to send telepathic messages in distress. She sends one out to Rachel Garth, who also possesses snake shape shifting abilities. She recently joined with some magic users including her new boyfriend, Gabe and Ariel, a friendly enemy. Rachel is determined to help Prisca and her mother and discovers that her link to Prisca goes beyond similar powers.
The Slither Queen hovers the right amount between Supernatural Horror and Urban Fantasy. There are some truly chilling skin crawling moments made even creepier by the fact that the characters can turn into serpents and therefore frighten many onlookers and Readers. One of the most startling scenes involves Rachel, who is still new to the shape shifting game and is only learning the difficulties of her powers. One of the difficulties is turning during the worst, most inopportune moments and not knowing when to turn it off. One chilling moment reveals this when she turns into a giant serpent while on a ferris wheel in full view of the public and has trouble reverting back to her human form.
The characters are interesting and complex. Rachel is the type of empathetic self-sacrificing protagonist in this type of subgenre, but she has some edges. Her past is a particularly dark one of abandonment, addiction, and estrangement from her mother and sister. Someone with such a toxic past as hers, could either become a bitter misanthrope living for only themselves or a caring idealist so others don’t suffer the way that they did. In Rachel’s case, she is the latter.
However, Rachel is somewhat bitter about her past, particularly at her mother. There is a running subplot where she has an uncomfortable reunion with her mother who stumbles into this predicament and she is briefly held captive by Blake and his worshippers. Mother and daughter are torn between their angry resentment and the hope for reconciliation.
Gabe and Blake are a little less complex but serve their purpose. Gabe is both a mentor and love interest to Rachel by guiding her through her shifting mistakes with compassion and knowledge. Blake alternates between seductive charisma and ruthless efficiency. He gives off a dangerous and sophisticated aura where it’s easy to see why he has no trouble mesmerizing potential followers and lovers. When he displays his authoritarian violent murderous tendencies,is when his true nature is revealed underneath the charming exterior.
By far the two most complex and interesting characters in this book are Ariel and Prisca. Ariel walks a thin line between good and evil, being a friend of Gabe’s and a follower of Blake’s cult. She fancies Gabe and resents Rachel’s intrusion in their lives. She conspires with Blake because of her intense romantic feelings for Gabriel and her burning jealousy for Rachel.
On the one hand, it is somewhat understandable that Ariel would feel possessive of Gabriel for years and rage at his attraction to Rachel, whom they just met. But there also comes a time where she has to learn that she is not entitled to him, nor does her love for Gabriel, justify the harm that she puts on Rachel and Prisca, especially the latter. It’s this line between understanding her behavior while not condoning her actions that make Ariel a complicated fascinating character.
Despite being a newborn, Prisca has more going for her than just sleeping and being breastfed by her mother. Despite being an infant, she has a wide range of powers including shifting and telepathy. This awesome but unskilled power is wrapped inside of a tiny body that can’t even sit up yet. It could be great but also explosive and Blake certainly recognizes this deadly possibility.
She also has some awareness of her surroundings that suggest deep wisdom despite having just been born. Her telepathic communications with Rachel come out in visuals, feelings, and short words to suggest a limited vocabulary and understanding, but an awareness of concepts like cause and effect, danger and safety, and possibly good and evil.
Prisca’s awesome power and how it relates to Rachel become more evident when we learn some secrets about them that link them together in various ways, physically, emotionally, and magically.
The Slither Queen might not be the best book for snake haters, but for everyone else it’s a highly recommended Urban Fantasy with plenty of magic, plenty of twists, and plenty of serpentine spirit.
