WANTED UNDEAD OR ALIVE may be read as a stand-alone, but all of the works in the Love at Stake series are excellent and do build on each other, so I advise reading them all just to get to this great book.

Phineas McKinney has a reputation as a lover-boy, but when he realizes that he, an African-American vampire, is a novelty, his feelings about maintaining that reputation start to fade, particularly when the one woman who makes him distracted by her beauty, ferocity, and personality doesn't want anything to do with him or any vampires.

He has had to deal with racism before he became a vampire, but now he has to deal with speciesism with the woman he has to work with to try and stop the Malcontents, evil vampires who rate humans as nothing more than cattle.

In addition, he has finally decided to stop hiding his vampire status from his little brother, whose fear and distress quickly returns to the hero worship he's always had. Phin has had to do some dark things to keep his family safe, so he's worried what the werewolf princess, Brynley, will think when she learns exactly what he has done. However he's more concerned that t the Malcontents be stopped.

WANTED UNDEAD OR ALIVE is up to Kerrelyn Sparks' regular standards of quality writing: it is funny, clever, and has characters (not just the protagonists, but everyone) that are richly detailed.