I wanted to like this book so badly. It’s a book by a Filipino author featuring Filipino lore so I was really excited about this. Sadly, the execution fell flat.

It was obvious that the author really wanted to highlight the Filipino culture and I appreciated that. I’m glad that a lot of Filipino authors have been expanding into an international audience. I do appreciate what the author was trying to do but, unfortunately, there are a couple of things I find lacking.

First, the writing feels a bit clunky. Some of the sentences don’t flow smoothly and the conversations don’t sound conversational at all. Also, the characters kept on ‘peddling’ when they should be ‘pedaling’. It’s a simple mistake but it was scattered all over the book (there were 26, I counted) and it became really annoying.

Second, and more importantly, I cannot get past the inaccuracies in this book. No one can travel from Capiz to Sagada in a jeepney (unless you go by RoRo, and even then, you’d have to drive a day or so!). Sagada is also in a mountain range so it doesn’t have ‘sandy beaches’. I think these are details that could have been caught in editing and I hope these can still be fixed before the book’s official release.

There are some scenes that didn’t seem relevant and did not do anything to advance the plot. Chapter 2 could have been deleted and the book would still be the same. It took so long for things to actually become interesting, and by then, I had already given up.

I rarely DNF books and always try to stick out until the very end but this book has proven to be a mountain I cannot climb.

When Marcella Leones relocates her family of aswang vampires from the Philippines to Portland, Oregon, she raises her grandchildren under strict rules so humans will not expose them. Her only wish is to give them a peaceful life, far away from the hunters and the Filipino government that attempted to exterminate them.

Before she dies, she passes on the power to her eldest grandchild, Percival. He vows to uphold the rules set forth by Leones, allowing his family to roam freely without notice. After all, they are aswangs.

However, when the aswang covenant is broken, the murder rate in Portland rises drastically. Who is behind the murders? And who is behind the broken covenant? Along with sensie Penelope Jane, Percival must find the truth.

Full of thrilling, juicy suspense and fascinating cultural folklore, Vampires of Portlandia explores the bonds and obligations of family - both the good and the bad while exploring for the truth and what's haunting their new home they discover that there are other breeds of aswangs—werebeasts, witches, ghouls, and viscera—who have been residing in Portland for years. Such a good book if you're looking for adventuring vampires with a cultural background.