Sabotage: Book 2 in the Occupation Series – review

Author: Jeff Dawson

First published: 2018

Contains spoilers

The blurb: June 22nd, 1941. Hitler launches Operation Barbarossa. He defiantly states that when the door is kicked in, Stalin’s corrupt government will collapse. German forces stream across the open plains, devouring everything in their path. There is nothing to stop them, or is there?

The clans have melded together and for the moment are working as one. They buried Stephan and are looking for quarters where Nicole and Dmitri can birth their child. No one knows that another child will born that will rip the clans apart, except one.

In Southern Russia, Nikoli’s brother, Konstantin watches the developments with great curiosity. He knows a battle is coming, he just doesn’t know where or when they will start fighting the new invaders.

And deep in Wewelsburg Castle, Doctor Mannheim is trying to unveil the mystery of vampiric blood.

The action and intrigue move at a frenzied pace as the soil of Russia is being drenched with German and Russian blood.

Prepare, if you dare, for the second installment of the Occupation series.

The review: Whilst it was a good read, I found myself having one or two issues with Occupation so let me say upfront that the issues I listed have, for the most part, been addressed in the second volume. The first volume had some typos – not an horrendous amount but enough to be memorable. I, unfortunately, didn’t note where so I promised the author I would in book 2 – there were no noticed typos. The other issue I had was in the characterisation – this time the characters became stronger, more distinct plus the widening vista of the story and quickened pace conspired with the stronger characterisation to invest the reader within the plot.

Once more we are in Eastern Europe during the Second World War and the Nazis are burning through Russia. The Polish based vampire clans are in an uneasy truce, consolidated by a mating between the two clans (and the whole aspect of true born vampires within the book’s lore is interesting and unusually drawn), but they are drawn into the world of Nikoli’s brother Konstantin. Based in Russia, and allied with General Zhukov, he and the other clans start using partisan methods to harry the Germans and stretch their supplies thin. As an aside, it is astounding how films can affect the reader’s perception of literature – I could only see Zhukov as Jason Issacs, given his performance as the Head of the Red Army in the Death of Stalin (2017). Meanwhile Himmler is all too aware of the vampires and is having research carried out on vampiric blood.

But as well as the Second World War aspects we have continued machinations within the clans. I mentioned Nikoli’s redemption arc with Svetlana seemed easily achieved, but I spoke too soon. The author spectacularly pulls them apart in this volume with a definite eye to further impacts in volume 3.

This volume built on the good ideas of volume 1 but did so with a greater confidence evident and a wider view that makes the second volume not only a continuance of story, but a superior volume in its own right. 7.5 out of 10.

In e-format @ Amazon US

In e-format @ Amazon UK