Upcoming: PRINCE LESTAT by Anne Rice (Chatto & Windus)

Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles remain some of my favourite novels – as I’m sure I’ve mentioned many times already on CR, I consider The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned among my top five favourite novels (as one selection – they have to be read together). It was with much excitement, therefore, that I saw that Rice was returning to the series after 11 years away – 2003’s Blood Canticle was the last novel until now. As with any long-running series, it had its ups and downs, and while certain elements of the later novels didn’t work for me, I nevertheless eagerly purchased and read them on their publication days. Prince Lestat will be no different, I’m sure (unless I can get a review copy…). Here’s the synopsis:

The vampire world is in crisis – their kind have been proliferating out of control and, thanks to technologies undreamed of in previous centuries, they can communicate as never before. Roused from their earth-bound slumber, ancient ones are in thrall to the Voice: which commands that they burn fledgling vampires in cities from Paris to Mumbai, Hong Kong to Kyoto and San Francisco. Immolations, huge massacres, have commenced all over the world.

Who – or what – is the Voice? What does it desire, and why?

There is only one vampire, only one blood drinker, truly known to the entire world of the Undead. Will the dazzling hero-wanderer, the dangerous rebel-outlaw Lestat heed the call to unite the Children of Darkness as they face this new twilight?

Anne Rice’s epic, luxuriant, fiercely ambitious new novel brings together all the worlds and beings of the legendary Vampire Chronicles, from present-day New York and Ancient Egypt to fourth-century Carthage and Renaissance Venice; from Louis de Pointe du Lac; Armand the eternally young; Mekare and Maharet; to Pandora and Flavius; David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the Secret Talamasca; and Marius, the true child of the Millennia. It also introduces many other seductive supernatural creatures, and heralds significant new blood.

Prince Lestat is due to be published in the UK by Chatto & Windus, on October 30, 2014; and in the US by Knopf, on October 28th, 2014. Below are the US and earlier UK covers (according to the author’s Facebook page, the latter has been replaced by the image at the top of this post):

Reviews, Debuts, Vampires, A Different Time…

I have been a fan of Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles ever since I picked up Interview with the Vampire in 1999. I was living in New York at the time, and I went to Barnes & Noble on 51st & Lexington (in the CitiCorp Building), and came across the series. Even though I hadn’t read any of the novels, by this point I had seen the movie, starring Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Antonio Banderas, and a scene-stealing Kirsten Dunst. I really enjoyed it (and still do), so I thought I’d give the series a try. I proceeded to read all of the volumes then in print, and then bought each new book on day of release.

I didn’t think the first novel was perfect, and I found the fact that it was written as a conversation slightly strange – I was young and not very well-read or refined at the time. Nevertheless, it planted the seed that has had me eagerly await any new book by Anne Rice ever since. I consider the first two sequels, The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned, as one of my five favourite novels of all time (I can’t read one without immediately reading the next, so I consider them as a single book).

Time to get to the point of the post: I have also been reviewing books for almost seven years, and movies and music for a few years more than that. I therefore found this post on Anne Rice’s Facebook feed, attached to a link, rather interesting:

Interview with the Vampire was actually a flop when it was published, severely hurt by a negative New York Times review by Leo Braudy. I’m not sure a review can kill a book today. But this was 1976, a different world. And a first novel, especially a very unusual one, was I think tragically vulnerable to the power of the Times… Now 37 years later Interview is (I’m grateful to say) an unqualified success and is still in print in hardcover as well as in paperback…

Sadly, the review is behind the New York Times pay-wall (which I still couldn’t read, despite supposedly having access to a specific number of articles per month…). Nevertheless, and perhaps a little strangely, Barnes & Noble’s listing for the book has the following quotation from Leo Braudy, apparently from “Books of the Century, The New York Times, May, 1976”:

“Anne Rice’s publishers mention the Collector and the Other, but it is really The Exorcist to which Interview with the Vampire should be compared, and both novelist William Peter Blatty and filmmaker William Friedkin, whatever their faults did it much better... The publicity tells us Rice is a ‘dazzling storyteller.’ But there is no story here, only a series of sometimes effective but always essentially static tableaus out of Roger Corman films, and some self-conscious soliloquizing out of Spider-Man comics, all wrapped in a ballooning, pompous language.”

I thought it was interesting that Rice said she’s “not sure a review can kill a book today”. I think she’s probably right. Not only is the internet allowing critiques, criticism and praise to spread all over the world, but also the fact that negative reviews only seem to generate extra interest in books. Take two (admittedly unusual) examples: 50 Shades of Grey, or Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (which got, effectively, a bad review from the Vatican = publisher’s Holy Grail).

I also think Braudy is wrong his statement that “there is no story” in the novel. There’s quite a lot, actually. Yes, it’s “static”: it’s a book-length interview. What was he expecting? I don’t understand the Spider-Man connection, but it stands out, no? I don’t know the other references he presents, so I can’t speak to those. The connection to The Exorcist is an interesting one, but I don’t know either the book or movie version of that story well enough.

I’m sure this would have been a more interesting post if I’d had access to the review, but there we go [and if I hadn’t been writing it during a bout of insomnia, at 3:30am]. I’ll keep trying to get the text, and see if it adds anything to the discussion. Or, at the very least, offer some interesting quotations from it as/when I find them.

What do you think? Can negative reviews kill books today? If not, why not?

“The Wolf Gift” by Anne Rice (Arrow/Random House)

After reinventing the Vampire for modern literature, Anne Rice turns her attentions to Werewolf mythology with great success

MAN OR MONSTER?

After a brutal attack Reuben finds himself changing. His hair is longer, his skin is more sensitive and her can hear things he never could before.

Now he must confront the beast within him or lose himself completely.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before on the site, but Anne Rice is one of my favourite authors. Reading the Vampire Chronicles was a turning point in my life as a reader, and indeed set me on the path that turned me into as voracious a reader as I am today. The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned have been re-read so many times, I almost know them off by heart. It was with great interest, therefore, that I started reading The Wolf Gift – after redefining vampire fiction with her novels, I was really interested to see what Rice could do with that other supernatural mainstay, the werewolf. What she’s come up with is pretty great.

Upcoming: Anne Rice’s WOLF GIFT Blog Tour

The 1,000th…

This is my 1,000th post on Civilian Reader. Which is pretty cool. I’d never expected to keep the blog going this long – nor did I ever expect it to become even remotely as popular as the stats suggest. I started it as a way to write about the books I was reading, more in order to keep my hand in at writing during long, empty stretches of my PhD (months of reading, followed by couple-of-week-blitzes was my normal approach to each chapter).

I’m not sure what I actually intended to do with this post. Perhaps ramble on at length about Lessons Learned, Milestones, and other self-indulgent topics. But the more I thought about it, the less interesting I thought that post would be.

Instead, I thought I’d offer just a quick few thoughts on some books that marked important milestones in my reading history before I started the blog, and have therefore not featured (or at least, not since people actually, you know, started reading it…). They are not always the best examples of any given genre that I’m fond of (a couple of them certainly aren’t), but they each hold a very special place on my shelves, and always will.

February 2012 Top Picks

The first half of this year alone sees a high number of highly anticipated titles coming out, and February is a particularly bumper month for the genre fan. So, here’s my top eight for this month. I doubt I’ll be able to read even half of them in February (the best laid plans, etc.), but I thought I’d offer at least a hat-tip for those I may not be able to get around to.

“Anne Rice’s Servant of the Bones” #1-4/6 (IDW)

A comic adaptation of Rice’s classic horror novel

Servant of the Bones is one of Rice’s novels that I’ve never got around to reading. I’m not sure why, actually. When I saw this was now available as a comic-adaptation, I looked up the premise (below, after the break) and it sounded pretty interesting. I really love Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, and I consider The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned to be one of my favourite books (they go together so well, I count them as just one – I can never read them on their own). So, seeing as I’m becoming more familiar with the comic genre, I decided to give this a try. I find myself with mixed feelings about the series, although I should say they lean mostly towards the positive.

Missing, presumed…

That’s a bit of a vague title, I know. Just thought I’d write a quick post to highlight some glaring oversights in the Amazon Kindle UK Store. To be fair, that it’s a “glaring oversight” is completely my own opinion, as I’m sure there are other novels and series that are higher priority for… well, probably everyone, but maybe if I write this, someone will notice…

1. John Sandford, Prey Series

I’m a huge fan of Sandford’s writing, and the Lucas Davenport/Prey series is easily my favourite crime thriller series. The characters are brilliantly rendered, the setting is not one I’m familiar with (Minnesota and sometimes Wisconsin), yet the author can bring the locations to life. From the very first in the series (Rules of Prey) to the latest (Storm Prey), I’ve always been engrossed and entertained by the books. That the author has managed to maintain the quality for a staggering 20 books is amazing, and matched by very few authors. Add to this the Virgil Flowers companion series (Bad Blood, the fourth in the series, will be released soon), and the four, beloved Kidd novels, and Sandford is one of the best crime authors in the world. He seems to be largely unknown in the UK, however (or, at the least, insufficiently promoted).

I would love to get all of Sandford’s novels for my Kindle, so I can start reading them again.

2. Anne Rice, Vampire Chronicles

Specifically, I’m talking about the first five books: Interview With the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, Queen of the Damned, Tale of the Body Thief, and Memnoch the Devil. I first read these when I was 16yrs old, and I was enthralled by Rice’s gift for writing atmospheric, intriguing and thoughtful novels about vampires (yes, I know, not much vampire fiction is particularly deep, these days…). Rice touches on such a wide range of issues in her novels – religion, violence, sociopathy, love, humanity, power, to name but a handful – that it’s impossible for these novels to not get under your skin. Rice isn’t opposed to writing passages or about themes that will make the reader squirm, forcing us to think about or confront uncomfortable or taboo subjects.

Sure, they’re also highly entertaining, too, but I guarantee you’ll get more from reading these five books than you ever will from Charlaine Harris, Stephanie Meyer, or any other producer of the new Vampire-fiction crowd.

3. Jonathan Franzen

Strangely, given how successful and popular this author is, neither The Corrections or new opus Freedom appear to be available for the UK Kindle. In what can only be a happy coup for Sony, they are available through their eBookstore.

This is annoying for two reasons: First, because I really want to know what all the fuss is about; and second, the books are huge, and I just don’t have space for two more brick-sized volumes in my already tiny living quarters.

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On a happier note, however, Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels are almost all available for the Kindle, so that’s got to be a good thing! Other publishers who seem to be embracing the platform are Pyr (I’ll be buying lots of their releases), Orbit (can now take some of my favourite fantasy novels travelling with me), and bit-by-bit Gollancz/Orion.

I imagine I will finally give Stieg Larsson’s novels a try, too. The Kindle versions are really cheap, and the Kindle Sample option will allow me to try-before-I-buy. It really is a great service, and Amazon should be applauded for adding/developing it.

I’m actually surprised I haven’t tried the Millennium Trilogy sooner – if for no other reason than the tattoo depicted on the cover is very similar to my own. Not the best reason to try a book, I know, but still…

To borrow a couple of memes

Two posts from two bloggers I follow have caught my eye, so I thought I’d consolidate my responses to these memes into one post. The first, from The Speculative Scotsman, is a pretty short one, which I happened to be talking about yesterday with Alyssa (my newest writing-slave reviewer), so I liked that it was timely:

As reviewers, do you read other reviewers' reviews before composing your own?

Simple answer: no. In fact, I rarely read any reviews anymore, despite subscribing to so many RSS feeds from book bloggers. I guess it’s partly to avoid being (sub)consciously influenced by what people I respect have to say (which is actually limited to only a very few bloggers – who shall remain nameless, because we can’t be inflating any egos now…). It’s also because this site is predominantly reviews, so I would rather read more news and opinion pieces than reviews of books I might be reading, or will read in the future. It is, however, a weird feeling to discover a review that’s so similar to one I’ve written. I think the only reviews I read now are for books I’ve already read and/or reviewed. This can often be unhealthy, as I end up wishing my reviews were so insightful or, in some cases, literary (it’s a long time since I last studied literature, and I have a weird complex about not knowing all the proper phrases, sometimes). I do still read a lot of non-fiction reviews; not to influence my own, but mainly because I need to decide on what to buy for my PhD and my ever-growing collection of books on the US Presidents…

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The second meme, which I came across in a post by Adam Christopher, is a little more involved and fun – and made me think of the “Top 5s…” from High Fidelity for some reason. There are a handful of books and/or series that could have been the answer for almost every question (Terry Pratchett, Scott Lynch, etc.), but I’ve tried to be as varied as possible to keep things vaguely interesting. So here are the questions (in bold) and my answers to each:

One Book that Changed my Life

This was quite an easy choice: James Clavell’s Tai-Pan, which I reviewed a little while ago, because it made me fall in love with reading ‘proper’ books. It had the unfortunate side-effect of also making it difficult to find other books as good or enjoyable for a while, but it is still a firm favourite and definitely a book that changed my life: mostly because it made me want to write.

I shall add another, which is important for a different reason. Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora, which opened my eyes to fantasy fiction again, and is also one of my favourite books of all time. It’s just brilliant and works on every single level for me. It is also one of the books I recommend most to other people…

… Except for everything Discworld by Terry Pratchett, which also goes in this category. Pratchett’s books showed me that ‘comic’ fantasy didn’t have to be ridiculous to be enjoyable, and that it could be intelligent and many-layered behind the jokes and gags. An exceptional talent who deserves every word of praise he’s ever received and more.

One Book you have to read more than once

Anne Rice’s The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned. I consider these novels as one, because I never read one without the other. They were re-released recently through Sphere, but I’ve been reading them for years. I even remember reading them in New York, when I lived there – one of my favourite winters, actually: the snow was deep and made the city even more beautiful, and I wandered the city, stopping at various coffee-shops to read my way through Rice’s first five vampire novels.

Lestat and Queen were written just as Rice was really taking off and producing her very best novels – her gift for description, atmosphere and scene-setting (perfectly employed in these two novels) are still unsurpassed, and she’s able to evoke powerful images and impressions of her characters’ emotions and also the different times and locations brilliantly. True, the series waned in impact as it continued (though I still really enjoyed Merrick, which properly brought her other series – The Mayfair Witches – into the timeline). I’ve read these two about four times, now, and I think I’ll be doing so again in the Autumn, when I’m hoping to get a review of the first five Vampire Chronicles written (Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat Lestat, The Queen of the Damned, The Tale of the Body Thief and Memnoch the Devil).

One Book you’d want on a Desert Island

I’m thinking something really long… If I had to choose something right this instant, I imagine I’d end up picking Justin Cronin’s The Passage, because it’s really long and I’ve only heard very good things about it.

But, to be really difficult, I’d actually take my eReader with me, because I have 90 books on it, and that should keep me going for bit. (I know, there’s always one person who has to answer ‘cleverly’…)

I’m possibly one of the biggest boosters for eBooks, as I adore my reader – so much, in fact, that I’ve rarely considered upgrading it to a new, touch-screen edition. (I’ll admit that I considered ordering a new, slate-coloured Kindle DX, but decided against it. I might also consider the new larger-screened Sony Reader, but it’s not available in the UK, yet.)

Two Books that made you Laugh

This would have to be a Discworld novel. It’s difficult to choose just the one, though. Probably something from the Guards selection: Guards Guards, Men at Arms, Feet of Clay, Jingo, Fifth Elephant, Night Watch, and Thud!

That being said, there are a couple other Discworld novels that have made me laugh. Hogfather, because it is all-round brilliant and I still quote plentifully from it. The Truth, also, is a great novel and I like the central focus on the press and media. Also, it’s a novel that has meant I can’t help but find the name ING Direct funny (just read it, you’ll understand).

One Book that made you Cry

I haven’t cried at a book for years. Sorry, I just don’t tend to cry because of something I’ve read.

When I was younger, however, I did cry when one of my favourite characters in Brian Jacques’s Martin the Warrior (1993) died… It was a series I was completely in love with when I was a kid. Martin the Warrior, the sixth in the series (now at 21 books), was the last that I read. Jacques, as I recall, had a great skill at making his (young) readers feel connected to his characters, despite them being anthropomorphised rodents and small woodland creatures. The memories are just swarming back, now…

Anyway, let’s move on. A couple of things that do make me cry, are the first couple episodes of The West Wing Season Two (I am rather obsessed with that series, and have become very enamoured with the characters during the multiple times I’ve re-watched all seven series), and most recently the movie The Blind Side, which I thought was amazing (and Sandra Bullock definitely deserved the Oscar!).

One Book you wish you’d Written

Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora, for reasons of excellence and sheer imaginative brilliance. Perhaps also Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, because he made an absolute fortune from it. I would, of course, then write books I wanted to, hopefully better, without any fear of worrying whether or not I’d be able to afford to eat again…

Actually, the books I really wish I’d written are the ones I’m planning at the moment. Tentatively under the working series title The Amderlin Chronicles, they’re set in a world of my own making and I hope could be compared – in genre/style/setting (if not quality) – to Scott Lynch, Joe Abercrombie, James Enge, Brent Weeks and the like.

I’ve just started an  complete re-working of everything, so they’re still in the absolute basic stages of writing. I’ve got the basic story of the first three novels, as well as the international affairs environment they are set within, but I’m having difficulty working out the details. Not sure I’ll get too far on these until I’ve finished my PhD, however.

One Book you wish was NEVER Written

Amazingly, I can’t think of anything. I don’t like to be too negative about any books, as I always assume that there is someone, somewhere, who will like every book – even if it’s just the author’s mum. I shall demure, therefore, from answering this question.

Two Books you are Currently Reading

John Sandford’s Storm Prey – the 20th in the Lucas Davenport/Prey series, and shaping up quite well – although, Sandford is unusually giving a little too much detail of a surgery that helps anchor the story as a backdrop (it’s interesting, but do we need that much detail?). I’m a big fan of Sandford’s series, having read most of these in order and in one go, when I discovered them – my first was Certain Prey (released in 1999 in the US, but I read it in 2004).

Evan Thomas’s The War Lovers – perhaps the best book I’ve read about 19th/20th turn-of-the-century US history. Brilliantly written, researched and crafted, this is easily one of my favourite books of the year, and favourite history books ever. Simply amazing. Theodore Roosevelt is one of my favourite presidents, and the portrait of him in The War Lovers is one of the best I’ve come across – Thomas offers neither damning nor a glowing characterisation. TR’s friendship with Henry Cabot Lodge is equally fascinating. Overall, this is a fascinating book on one of my favourite periods of US history. (I will hopefully have the review done very soon, work permitting.)

One Book you’ve been Meaning to Read

As I am wont to do, I’ve done my own thing and come up with two (from an ever-growing list): Patrick Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind and Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. Both of them have received a ridiculous amount of praise from all quarters – particularly the latter, which has been recommended to me by two of the people whose opinion I value and respect above all others. Considering its size, and the growing pile of books I have to review, however, it keeps getting put to the side. I’ve heard amazing things about Chabon’s writing, but have thus far only read a few samples of his non-fiction articles (specifically, his essays about genre narratives and superheroes).

Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind is a book that has sat on my shelf ever since it came out in paperback in the UK. Unfortunately, it came out just as I started to receive more books for review, which meant I focussed more on getting those read and reviewed than NotW read. I still intend to read it soon, but we know how flexible my plans and timetables can be…

 

So, that’s my take on these two memes. Hope they were in some way interesting. (Though, in all honesty, they were more self-indulgent than anything else.)

Am I an Anti-Urban Fantasy Snob?

You have to be totally dense to have missed the ‘Urban Fantasy’/‘Paranormal Romance’ (‘UF’/‘PR’) genre crazy that has followed in the wake of Stephanie Meyer’s phenomenally successful Twilight series. I was rather turned off by the extreme hype that surrounded it, finding the swooning teenage girls irritating and the sudden blanket publicity rather oppressive (I only watched the first Twilight movie a couple months ago), and have until now pretty much tarred every novel pigeonholed in the genre with the same negative brush. Now that New Moon has been released, and the prevalence of the ‘Team Edward’  and ‘Team Jacob’ merchandise (see right), I’m even more wary of the genre and have even considered crossing the road to get away from the occasional rabid fan.

Have I been narrow-minded? Quite possibly. Ignoring the fact that I know postgraduate literature students who are fond of the Twilight novels (not all of them in an ‘ironic’ way – and don’t get me started on that), in some ways there are things that characterise these novels that I potentially could like very much. Reading some of the synopses or blurbs printed on the backs, I am put in mind of Buffy and Angel knock-offs in book-form. (One of Kelley Armstrong’s books was, after all, described as “mak[ing] Buffy look fluffy”, which I thought boded well.)

Being a fan of these two shows – not to mention Supernatural and Sanctuary, I’ve found myself thinking about giving some UF a try. After all, the books could benefit from the ‘unconstrained’ book format; less susceptible to network demands or controls, no need to worry about prime time taboos, and so forth.

I remain cautious, however. An awful lot of these novels sound like… well, soft-werewolf/vampire-porn trash. Sorry, but it’s true. Also, having flicked through some of them on the shelves of my local bookstore, I can certainly say that the ‘love’ scenes contained within are utterly laughable, and the least ‘erotic’ or ‘sensual’ things I’ve ever read, packed full of cliché and hyperbole, not to mention the unlikely fact that everyone in them appears to be an absolute master in the bedroom (or in the alley, on the desk, in back of the car, etc.), reading them makes me cringe. I’m no prude, but seriously – there’s a reason the Friends episode about Chandler’s romance-writer mother was so funny.

So where am I going with all this? Well, I’ve decided to swallow my prejudices – and pride – and read some urban fantasy novels. Thanks to the lovely people at Orbit and Solaris, I have a couple to start with. [At least, I think these count as Urban Fantasy…]

First off, Solaris sent me Natasha Rhodes’s Circus of Sins today, so I shall probably start with this one (it’ll still be a little while before I get to it, but thought I’d write something now anyway). The book’s design reminds me of a semi-horror novel I owned years ago, by Kristin Kathryn Rusch (Sins of the Blood), so it caught my attention. Here’s the synopsis from the back cover:

When young Vampire-Hunter Kayla Steele is bitten by a werewolf, she thinks it’s the end of her world. However, little does she know that the real end of the world is not that far away. Master Vampire Harlequin has made a deal with the Devil and is now planning to commit the ultimate sin – killing an angel – which will trigger an ancient curse and bring about war in heaven.

If that happens, it will be the end of mankind forever.

Kayla’s only hope now lies in a mysterious stranger named Niki, who knows where the angel is being kept. Together, they must rescue the angel before midnight on Sunday in order to stave off Armageddon. But unless Niki is who he claims to be, the stakes just got one hell of a lot higher…

This is actually book three in the series (which started with Dante’s Girl and then The Last Angel – both also released through Solaris), but for once I’m not obsessive enough to insist on reading the entire series: there’s bound to be some form of catch-up passage in here, so I will just stick with that. It sounds very much like a grander Buffy plot, so I’m actually rather looking forward to this. I might bump it up the review roster/timetable, depending on my mood when I finish my current read (Joseph Finder’s excellent thriller, Vanished). I will also happily admit to being swayed by the testimonial from Dan Abnett (one of my favourite authors), who is quoted on the back cover:

“Taut and gripping. Natasha Rhodes’s prose is that precious thing: the stuff you just can’t put down…”

The second novel is a slightly different: Marjorie M. Liu’s The Iron Hunt, which is the first in her Hunter Kiss series. Despite the terrible tag-line that graces the top-right of the artwork (“Dark Blood Will Flow”), it again has a rather interesting premise:

During the day, Maxine’s tattoos are her armour and she is invincible. At night, they peel from her skin to take on forms of their own, leaving her human and vulnerable – and showing themselves to be demons sleeping beneath her skin. But these demons are the best friends and bodyguards a woman can have. And Maxine needs bodyguards. She is the last in a line of women with power in their blood, trained to keep the world safe from malignant beings who would do us harm.

But ten thousand years after its creation, the prison dimension that kept the worst of these from us is failing, and all the Wardens save Maxine are dead. She must bear the burden of her bloodline and join the last wild hunt against the enemy.

It sounds rather like Buffy again (“The last of her kind, a Warrior awaits the call”), and the “prison dimension” put me in mind of the ‘Phantom Zone’ of the Superman mythos. I am particularly intrigued by the idea of the living tattoos (one assumes it will be an idea better executed than the fellow in the Elektra movie with the living tattoos). So, again: rather interested in reading this one.

The final UF I have lined up is Kelley Armstrong’s Frostbitten. I’m not strictly sure if this is actually UF, but it seems to be lumped in to the genre all too often, so it’ll count (I think the same can be said for Laura K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake series). I’m actually less cautious about reading this, as I have already read one of Armstrong’s thrillers, Exit Strategy, which I thought was very good and written in an interesting, and quirky style (at least, quirky for a thriller). Armstrong’s UF series, however, are both more popular and more established. Here’s the synopsis of Frostbitten:

After years of struggle, Elena Michaels has finally accepted her life as a werewolf, and learned how to control her wild side.

At least, that’s what she believes when she sets off to investigate a series of gruesome murders outside Anchorage. The truth, however, is more complicated. Trapped in a frozen, unforgiving terrain, Elena is forced to confront a deadly secret, and her own, untamed nature…

The third book in series sequence, which has recently been re-packaged by Orbit, Armstrong’s books are clearly being aimed at the Twilight market. The press literature that came with Frostbitten even mentions that “partly in thanks to the explosion of the Twilight phenomenon, sales of Bitten have doubled recently”.  The first in the series, Bitten, was published in 1999 in a previously non-existent (practically) ‘paranormal fiction’ genre. The success of Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld series opened the door for authors like Meyer and Charlaine Harris (whose novels have now been turned into HBO series True Blood). The Women of the Otherworld series is now pretty long, featuring eleven books: Bitten, Stolen, Dime Store Magic, Industrial Magic, Haunted, Broken, No Humans Allowed, Personal Demon, Men of the Otherworld, Living With The Dead, Tales of the Otherworld, and Frostbitten. The next in the series, Waking The Witch, will be released on August 5th 2010, through Orbit.

[  Canada  /  US  / UK  ]

So. Urban Fantasy – the jury’s still out, but I’ll read the three novels mentioned above, and get back to you. Should be an interesting couple of weeks, at any rate – who knows, I might even be sucked in to the genre and read everything in it!

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As a side-note, I wonder if, had they been released today, Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles would have been listed as ‘Urban Fantasy’ or ‘Paranormal Romance’?

Certainly, books such as Blood & Gold, Pandora, Vittorio the Vampire, and The Vampire Armand are sufficiently… well, tame to appeal to the Twilight crowd, even if they are certainly more ‘grown-up’ ( despite the overuse of the word “love” in these novels, to an extent where I now raise an eyebrow at its every use).

Rice’s output pretty much fizzled out after Memnoch the Devil (book five of the Chronicles), sadly. Merrick was the last one to really grab me from start to finish. The other novels in the series never really felt as necessary, engrossing or bewitching as earlier volumes, despite remaining good reads – this is largely down to Rice’s gift for writing atmospheric scenes and making you feel almost present in the novel.

The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned remain two of my favourite books of all time, though, so expect a retrospective review soon. Probably quite soon, as I’ve recently re-watched the superb Interview With A Vampire and the less-superb Queen of the Damned.

I do seem to be in the mood for vampire-related media, recently: I watched all three Underworld movies last week, and I intend to work my way through the Blade trilogy as well next week.