Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice

There are two major traditions when it comes to vampire fiction. In the first and older conception of them, they are out-and-out monsters, demons lusting after mortal blood from beyond the grave. Examples of this would include Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot or the original Dracula to some extent. The second tradition humanizes vampires, focusing on the men and women they once were rather than the supernatural beings they have become. Interview with the Vampire is of the latter camp, one I admit I have had little patience for in the past. Anne Rice won me over, however, with her fascinating study of the impact immortality and the supernatural might have on the mortal mind, as well as her startlingly poignant prose and elegant narrative styl... Read More

The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice

Anne Rice's second vampire novel is both a prequel and a sequel to her original story Interview with the Vampire. A sequel because it is framed by a sequence of events in contemporary times, and a prequel because it recounts the history of the vampire Lestat, the sire of the protagonist Louis in Interview. After waking from centuries-sleep in 1980's New Orleans, Lestat discovers the Interview manuscript and goes about setting the story straight, recounting his mortal life as a young French aristocrat, his transformation into a vampire, and his ongoing quest to find the answers behind his new condition. Stretching from the French Revolution to Egyptian myth to the modern day world, his journey is one that only an immortal could take, and we're lucky enough to be taken along for the ride.

Lestat is perhaps R... Read More

The Queen of the Damned by Anne Rice

I have to admit to being rather disappointed with The Queen of the Damned. I came into the third book in Anne Rice’s VAMPIRE CHRONICLES fresh from the excellent The Vampire Lestat and ready for more. At the end of The Vampire Lestat, the reader is left with the distinct impression that everything in Rice’s meticulously constructed vampire universe is about to explode, and I was excited. It was the grand conclusion of the initial trilogy! Told from multiple perspectives! It was called The Queen of the Damned! (Honestly, that has to be the best title ever for a vampire novel.) In short, I was not burnt out on the series by this point. I was ready to love the novel. It just wasn’t to be.

The major problem with The Queen of the Damned Read More

Merrick by Anne Rice

I was looking forward to the story of Merrick, a distant biracial cousin of the famous Mayfair Witches, who practices voudoun. I was looking forward to Louis's quest for the ghost of Claudia — but then I've always liked Louis.

In this book, in fact, a lot of interesting things happen to Louis — the Claudia thing, a new love, and a complete change of heart about how much vampiric power he wants. (I'll try not to commit a spoiler by telling any more details than that.) In other words, lots of character development.

So, my major gripe with this book is that it isn't told from Louis's point of view, but David Talbot's.

See, David has had a crush on Merrick since she was a teenager seeking refuge with the Talamasca. And while some of the interaction between David and Merrick is interesting, I would have preferred to cut a few of the chapters describing the infatuation, making room ... Read More

Blood and Gold by Anne Rice

I enjoyed this book, except for the subplot about the Norse vampire, Thorne, at the beginning and end. This frame story had a lot of promise but ended up making little sense to me. I think maybe it alludes to Norse myth, which has never been my forte. Whatever the reason, it left me scratching my head.

But at least it gets Marius telling his life story, and perhaps because the "interviewer" is a stranger, he feels comfortable opening up about all sorts of things. In the words of Alanis Morissette, it's "strangely exciting, to watch the stoic squirm." Yes, at times Marius's story seems really familiar, since most of the major plot events have been told already in The Vampire Lestat, Pandora, and The Vampire Armand.

But now we know just how broken-up Marius was about some of the tragedies in his "life". We find ou... Read More

Blackwood Farm by Anne Rice

In the ninth book in The Vampire Chronicles (though the books are self-contained and can be read out of order) we meet Tarquin "Quinn" Blackwood, a fledgling vampire with a serious problem. The book opens with a letter he has written to the famous Lestat, begging him for advice in how to deal with the continued presence of Goblin, a spirit that has dwelt with Quinn for his entire life but is now taking on frightening new characteristics and powers after Quinn's conversion to vampirism.

To Quinn's surprise, Lestat agrees to help him, and joins him at his grand home of Blackwood Farm where Quinn begins to tell his story. Beginning in childhood and ending with his transformation into a vampire, Quinn's autobiographical account takes up 90% of the book, with only a few chapters front and back that deal with events in the present time. This acc... Read More

The Witching Hour by Anne Rice

Although Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles are undoubtedly her most famous and best-selling novels, there is much to be said for her witch trilogy: The Lives of the Mayfair Witches. Although none of the characters who populate The Witching Hour are quite as memorable as her vampires, the plot and pacing of her witch-stories appeal to me more than anything else she has written to date. Her skills as a novelist are on fine display here and her storytelling techniques are utterly unique, including introductory chapters told through the eyes of family associates who experience unsettling experiences with the Mayfair family; the gradual intertwining of her two main characters through a series of `coincidental' events; and a large chunk of the novel ... Read More

Lasher by Anne Rice

As part of Anne Rice's The Lives of the Mayfair Witches trilogy, this installment comes after The Witching Hour in which we were introduced to three major concepts: a secret organisation called the Talamasca (best described as a supernatural FBI), a powerful family of witches known as the Mayfairs, and a strange spirit called Lasher that has haunted generations of Mayfairs, and been investigated by the Talamasca for centuries.

In the previous novel Rowan Mayfair, the latest matriarch of the Mayfair clan, rediscovered her roots and returned to her ancestral home in New Orleans. Marrying Michael Curry (who by strange coincidence has connections to both her and her circumstances), and learning about her heritage (which was documented diligently by the Talamasca), she eventually met the spirit Lasher and devi... Read More

Taltos by Anne Rice

The problem with this final installment in The Lives of the Mayfair Witches, is that the main plot (and most of its subplots) were begun in The Witching Hour and wrapped up neatly in its sequel Lasher. In these two previous books, Doctor Rowan Mayfair has returned to her family, discovered her witch heritage, married Michael Curry, come into contact with an organisation called the Talamasca (best described as a supernatural detective agency) unleashed the spirit Lasher on the world and — together with her husband — stopped him from achieving his goal of populating the world with his own species: the Taltos. What more was there to tell?

Well, there were a couple of loose threads, but nothing that couldn't have been cleared up in Lasher, and nothing that takes a whole ... Read More

Angel Time by Anne Rice

Anne Rice’s body of work plays a huge role in my history as a reader, and in fact was one of the “gateway drugs” that led me to fantasy. I discovered her books the summer before I left for college and spent the next several years procrastinating my studies all too often in favor of devouring her backlist. And a hefty backlist it was; her old books kept me busy for several years. The first one I read “new” was Pandora. Then, in the late nineties and early 2000s, Rice began to change her style and her portrayals of favorite characters, and I didn’t like her new books as much. I’d heard that her new Songs of the Seraphim series marked a return to her old writing style. Curiosity and nostalgia convinced me to give Angel Time a shot.

Angel Time’s protagonist is Toby O’Dare, a skilled hitman who has ju... Read More

Of Love and Evil by Anne Rice

I started Of Love and Evil with modest expectations. I’d been underwhelmed with the previous Songs of the Seraphim novel, Angel Time. I’m also increasingly annoyed with the trend toward publishing extremely slender books in hardcover. As it turns out, I was pleasantly surprised by Of Love and Evil. (I still think it makes a pretty skinny hardcover, though, at 192 pages.)

When we last saw Toby O’Dare, he had just learned that, ten years previous, his girlfriend Liona had given birth to his son. As Of Love and Evil opens, Liona brings Toby junior to California. Toby gets to see his old love again and meet his son for the first time. He’d love to spend more time with this newfound family, but the angel Malchiah has another mission for him.

Toby is sent to Renaissance Rome, where ... Read More