Hunting Prince Dracula (Stalking Jack the Ripper #2) By Kerri Maniscalco [Review]

RELEASE DATE: September 19, 2017
AUTHOR: Kerri Maniscalco
GENRE: Young-Adult, Historical, Mystery, Horror.
PUBLISHER: Jimmy Patterson
SUMMARY: Following the grief and horror of her discovery of Jack the Ripper’s true identity, Audrey Rose Wadsworth has no choice but to flee London and its memories. Together with the arrogant yet charming Thomas Cresswell, she journeys to the dark heart of Romania, home to one of Europe’s best schools of forensic medicine…and to another notorious killer, Vlad the Impaler, whose thirst for blood became legend.
But her life’s dream is soon tainted by blood-soaked discoveries in the halls of the school’s forbidding castle, and Audrey Rose is compelled to investigate the strangely familiar murders. What she finds brings all her terrifying fears to life once again.

“Perhaps it was time for fathers to teach their sons how to behave around young women. They were not born superior, no matter how society falsely conditioned them. We were all equals here.”

After finishing Stalking Jack The Ripper, I’ve been looking forward to read Hunting Prince Dracula. Although the first one didn’t wowed me much,  I’m still eager to read this book because it’s about Dracula and all the praises I’ve been hearing lately made me even more excited. So, Hunting Prince Dracula was a pleasant read and  it’s definitely better than the first book but sadly, it’s not going in to my favorite shelf. I loved the interesting plot which has a dark and Gothic vibe  but I felt the pacing of this book a bit slow. I’m really not a fan of slow paced books and maybe that’s why I didn’t love it as much as others did. Nonetheless, I still enjoyed the overall story especially sneaking around the creepy Bran castle at nights. Audrey and Thomas are pretty adorable in this book and we’ve got to see how their relationship develops further.

 The story continues right after where it was left off in the first book where Audrey finally finds out about the real identity of Jack The Ripper but sadly, it ends with a tragedy which has made a great impact on her. After the horrifying incident, Audrey finally leaves her home to travel to Romania to attend the School Of Forensic Science in Brans Castle. With her father’s permission, Audrey and Thomas both travel together to Romania. During their Journey to School, they come across a brutal murder which maybe connected to the legendary Vlad Dracula. Hence, they are dragged into another serial murder mystery which seems pretty much impossible to solve. Audrey still can’t forget the tragic events she had faced while dealing with the Jack the ripper’s case and she doesn’t know how she could handle this new case but when more bodies starts to appear, Audrey is pretty much compelled to investigate the mystery behind all these murders but what she finds at the end will leave her shocked to the core.

Audrey Rose is back again with her strong feminist power but this time, she’s struggling with a PTSD which makes her feel a bit less confident about herself. I really liked her character development in this book. Despite her insecurity, she always stood strong and never let anyone look down upon her especially the headmaster of the Forensic School who thinks she doesn’t belong there.  Thomas Cresswell is hopelessly in love with Audrey and he never gets tired of his sexual innuendo’s which always makes her blush. I freaking love his flirty and cocky personality. Even though I love his character, I need to be honest that he does some stupid things in this book which made me pretty mad at him. As for the romance part, I was a bit disappointed because there’s not much romance in this book but I did enjoyed the banters between them and how their relationship progressed further after some ups and downs. Coming to the secondary characters, we’re introduced to some new characters like Prince Nikolai, Ileana, Daciana, Anastasia and Noah. They all seemed okay-ish for the plot but they aren’t fleshed out well enough for me to love them.

I really liked the plot and all of its dark creepiness but the pacing kinda frustrated me a bit because I’m a girl who loves action. The first half is mostly focused on the forensic science classes and nothing exciting happens until you get to the second half. I loved Audrey and Thomas night time rendezvous. I always enjoy how they both try to solve the mystery together but in this book, Audrey does some daring investigation alone without anyone’s help. Like in the first book, there’s gore, and murders in this book if you’re uncomfortable with the gore-ish stuff, just skip those parts. There are lots of twists in the second half which really surprised me and I’m so glad this wasn’t as predictable as the first book. The writing was addictive, as always. The whole story was told from Audrey’s first person pov but I was really hoping for a dual pov. The setting of this book is absolutely fantastic. I think the author has done a great research on Vlad Dracula before writing this novel. The creepy castle, and the secrets passages in underground definitely gave a spooky feel to the story.

Overall, I really liked this sequel! Although I didn’t totally love it as much as others did, I enjoyed the story and I really can’t wait to read Audrey and Thomas’s next adventure in America.

Recommend it?

Despite my issues, I highly recommend this book to everyone especially to the readers who’re looking for a good Halloween read. This was really a dark, creepy and chilling read!

MY RATING:[3.5/5 Stars]

So, What do you think of this book? Have you read this yet? Do you want to read it?
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