vampire books

[Van Hellseek]

can anyone recommend a good vampire book? i've just spent the last hour trawling sites like amazon and all i can seem to find are books that are mainly written by women who seem to be putting the emphasis on romance. i'm not after a slightly gothy mills and boon, i'm looking for a decent vampire book. preferebly one with a modern city-based setting.

all the ones that don't sound like romance novels sound horribly cheesy ("bite club" anyone?). one name that keeps coming up for instance, is "laurell k hamilton", but i can honestly say i'll never read a vampire novel where the main character has the name "merry gentry".

anyone got any recomendations?

 

[Van Hellseek]

read all of them. in fact i started reading the series 11 years ago.

 

[Van Hellseek]

brian lumleys Necroscope series - very good

not sure...

The story revolves around a young man, Harry, that has the ability to speak to the dead. Over the course of the other book she battles vampires to protect earth alongside the ESPianoge branch of the British secret service and the dead actually rise up to protect Harry.

that sounds a little silly to me. :/

 

[Van Hellseek]

The Anita Blake books are very good (although I'm lead to believe they start getting a bit daft after about book 6 or 7)

The Merry Gentry books are not vamp books - they are more fairys and stuff (and some of it is very sexual - its like fantasy meets erotica)

While not purely vamp books, you might want to look at Kelley Armstrong books.

Sherrilyn Kenyon is another one that has been recomended to me but I've personally not read any yet.

Kim Harrison is quite good - again not mainly vamps but there are vamps there (one lot run a restaurant )

the anita blake books again seem to be putting massive emphasis on the sex. and they didn't get particularly favourable reviews. besides, they're by the same writer who came up with the name "merry gentry". a sin that will not be easily forgiven.


kelley armstrong - seems to be more werewolves than vampires. i began to read about one of her books...

In this thrilling new novel, a pregnant werewolf may have unwittingly unleashed Jack the Ripper on twenty-first-century–and become his next target.

haha!


Sherrilyn Kenyon - sounds like yet more romance... her books have titles like "fantasy lover" and "night pleasures" and the covers feature men with their six-packs out.

kim harrison - i admit some of these sound amusing, if a touch buffy-esque. but the thing that really puts me off is that the one i looked at was "every which way but dead", which aside from having an awful title had a tagline which talks about the characters lovelife. another female author writing romance novels disguised as gothic horror. :/

on a positive note though, i can't seem to find anything better so i might try one anyway.

 

[Van Hellseek]

One of the best "horror" books I read was called "The Light At The End", and was about vampires lurking in the subway tunnels in modern day New York City.

now this sounds much more up my alley. shame it's an 80's book though. was really hoping for something recent. might give it a look anyway though.

 

[Van Hellseek]

IIRC, the story is that the Police think that a serial killer is on the prowl in NYC, but it's really a vampire (called Rudy I believe).

if that was a plot spoiler you should be ashamed of yourself.

 

[Van Hellseek]

Nope, not a spoiler. The story reads from both points of view, the Vampire's and the detective's, so you know from the start what's going on.

cool i've ordered it now (cost 53p on ebay!).

may well still check out some of these others though.

 

[Van Hellseek]

i can certainly recommend this - its an all time classic

in my search i think i came across that... isn't it a 50's book or something (or maybe set in the 50's)?

 

[Van Hellseek]

has anyone read any "poppy z brite"?

 

[Van Hellseek]

"interview with the vampire" was a fantastic novel. as was the follow up "the vampire lestat", albeit to a lesser degree. after that the series went seriously downhill. The third book (queen of the damned) had too many unimportant characters which made the novel rather dull in many chapters.

after these three the series really plummets, and gets plain stupid. "the tale of the body snatcher" was one of the most ridiculous books i've read.
some of the later books are mildly interesting, but i wouldn't particularly recommend them. in fact to someone who had never read any of them i would recommend they just read the first and leave it at that.

also anne rice is far too concerened with vampires being gay with each other. what the hell is it with female authors? they just can't seem to put pen to paper without writing slushy rubbish. vampire novels should be vampire novels, not vampire-flavoured romance/erotica.

 

[Van Hellseek]

Blasphemy!!!

"ESPionage"? sounds like something out of buffy.


although i'm curious... are all the vampires in necroscope bad guys?

 

[Van Hellseek]

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. One of the newest vampire books. Hit number one in the New York Times Bestseller List. Must be good!

sounds mildly interesting, but average score on amazon was only 3.5/5. which doesnt warrant the cost of a hardback. maybe take a look when it's in paperback though.

OT - These are the "Sleeping Beauty" books under the name A.N. Roquelaure, they are very graphic, and quite shocking in some ways, well worth a read as a series that pushes the boundaries of "popular" fiction.

sounds like erotica for middle aged women :/

I've just checked my bookshelves, and the only other vampire books I have are 'Anno Dracula' by Kim Newman, and 'Burying the Shadow' by Storm Constantine. I can't remember much about them though, so that's probably not much of a recommendation though!

n/m, thanks for looking anyway!

i can't wait to get "the light at the end" (ordered from usa). sounds like just my kind of thing. plus all the reviews i read gave it at least 4/5 (mostly 5/5).