Interview With the Vampire

Rating:
Summary: I would recommend this book to any vampire fanatic.
Review: It's a very realistic portrayal of vampirism, so realistic you would think the writer is speaking from experience herself!

I would have given this book five stars if Rice wasn't so overly descriptive of everything. It's a bit much.. sometimes I was so lost in how everything looked and felt that I needed to do a bit of rereading to catch the actual plot. That is my only complaint though. I love this story and am looking forward to reading the rest of the Vampire Chronicles.



Rating:
Summary: INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE (ALFRED A. KNOPF BOOKS/1976)
Review: Rice's first book is now well established as a contemporary horror/American classic. In it her narrator, Louis, gives an eyewitness account of his own life and how he was initiated into the vampire underworld where the exchange for eternal life is to bring to others eternal death. Louis is compassionate, but self-centered and filled with existential self-loathing that (amazingly) doesn't cause the reader to become repelled by his continually depressing tone even though we follow him through decade after decade of history which spans nearly two hundred years. His vampire maker, Lestat, is more typical of Stoker's "DRACULA" (and the real Vlad The Impaler whom Stoker used as the model for his demonic count): an egotistical, spoiled brat who revels in his own monstrous capabilities and lavish taste, and who doesn't give a damn about losing his soul as long as he can gain the whole world. As a symbol of unabashed evil, he is an amazing creation and a suitable counterbalance to Louis' endless brooding. Their life together climaxes with Louis threatening to leave Lestat, and Lestat turning a little girl into a vampire which forces Louis to stay and take care of her. The life of little Claudia the vampire girl is a story unto itself as she shares Louis' love of books and art as well as Lestat's delight in ruthless killing. What happens to them is captivating, repulsive, and as hallucinatory as a nightmare. Throughout the book Louis seems desperate to find some good in all of this evil, but comes to a complete understanding of just how selfish he is and that there is no light to be found in deeds of darkness. That is why an act of goodness must be done by a person who enacts the good of Christ, and an act of evil can only be done by a person who is willing to enact the the evil of Satan. There are no gray areas of debate when it comes to the heart of the matter. Unfortunately, many teenagers and young kids find solace in Louis' alienation and feelings of being an outcast even to the point of wishing they could be a vampire like him (or worse, as they drift off into the self-absorbed world of the occult where Wicca and black magick and Satanism can turn you into a god of nothing) which is doubly sad and not to be blamed on Anne Rice ("THE CATCHER IN THE RYE" endured similar controversy for its seamy portrayal of a young, troubled soul whose adventures were argued to be a bad influence on the reading public). Louis' epiphany at the end save the book, and helps to shake off any intimations of immorality or the embracing of such immorality as a viable way of life. As a Christian I find that commendable. BIOGRAPHICAL SIDENOTE: Rice's five-year-old daughter Michele died from leukemia. A fact which spurred the author to write "INTERVIEW" in five weeks even though she denies that her daughter's death and her grief didn't inspire the creation of Claudia, a sickly, six-year-old child who is resurrected into an immortal vampire. HARSH LANGUAGE: about 25 words, VIOLENCE: about 43 scenes, SEXUAL REFERENCES: about 3 instances and an undercurrent of homo-erotic love between Louis and Armand.

Rating:
Summary: Laborious read...
Review: Anne Rice's INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE's praising reviews on this site puzzle me. I found the book to be anything but a page-turner at most parts. Even when the story picked up pace and became somewhat interesting, I found myself caught in a web of too many details and needless repetition about the characters personas. It was almost as if Rice is beating one over the head with the charcaters' personality flaws to make sure the reader does indeed "get it." The book could easily have been half its size.

The story itself was interesting at times, but as I said, the over abundance of details diminished the joy of encountering these parts. And the ending was not very believeable. The interviewer must have been a real idiot to want what he requested (won't give it away if you want to read it still).

If you want an excellent, page-turning vampire story, skip this and read 'SALEM'S LOT by Stephen King.

Rating:
Summary: Superficially Interesting, but Not Particularly Well-Done
Review: Maybe I just don't get it, but this novel didn't do anything for me. The storyline was fairly interesting, but not superb. The characters were well-developed: overdeveloped, even, in that Rice repeated their flaws. Reading, I felt as if I was being continuously bludgeoened with heavy-handed grandiose drippings of love and eternity and loneliness. This context was set tens of times throughout the novel, rather than - as I would have found preferential - set once, with the plot/storyline to develop off of it.

It seems as if the human population is decisively split between Rice fans, and Rice haters. Her writing can be tedious, at times, but is never difficult to read. About half-way through, one will feel inclined to seriously question as to whether any aspects of the book will change, or if the characters - at this point, Louis and Claudia - will simply continue on their well-worn path of searching for other Vampires and endless self-speculation and introspection.

This book is not without its merits: It deals with a fascinating subject matter that has romanticised mythology and spawned a film and novel genre. However, in all, I found this novel lackluster and overall uninteresting. Interview with the Vampire is worth reading if only for its place in the 'horror' canon, but not for the actual quality of the work. It exists as the seminal piece of fiction within this genre, however I may disagree with that, it should be acknowledged as such.

Rating:
Summary: A new look
Review: Vampires with emotion, is it truly hard to believe, life is life, a vampire would still have the basic inhibitions of humans, they just don't have the soul, their death reincarnated, not exactly monsters. I think the new out look in the world of Vampires is refreshing from, what used to be, 'He stalked her, nightly, she could feel his prescence but never saw who--or what it was. She was on a date now, and the awkward feeling that she had all the times in the past, were back again. Her boyfriend kissed her, and then the taste of blood filled her mouth. She looked up to see a tall diviner male sucking the blood from her boyfriend. Then before she could speak she was next.' Cut to weeks later. 'The hunter examined the bodies at the morgue, and just as the eyes burst opened he stabbed them in the heart. Just another job for the hunter.' That's ridiculous, over done, and over used.
Anne Rice brought a refreshing new outlook, and the good part was, it only got better from here.

Rating:
Summary: the first depressive vampire
Review: A book about sorrow, questions, passions, very erotic and captivating. Loved it! A book about human nature and types - Louis, the analythical type, Lestat - powerfull, Armand - charismathic, sophisticated and sensual, Claudia - cold and calculated. A drama of imortal life when all you know & love changes and you can't understand. Viewed by Louis, life is so sad. I believe Louis is the first depressive vampire in all the stories, a vampire with a human soul, suffering each time he kills. Such a cold immortal heart and yet such pain. Looking for a master more than for answers he hates Lestat, not a good teacher, he loves Claudia but in spite that love he still feels miserable and alone. He thinks he finds in Armand someone to guide him, someone strong. Armand is the best vampire-character ever created. Anyhow, much, much better than the film!

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating. Could not put down.
Review: I'd never read an Anne Rice novel and this was amazing. Sucked me in right from the start. Her literary talent is something to study as well as enjoy. She knows New Orleans so well, I could feel the moist air, smell the smells. I felt like I was there.

And the world of the vampires she created was so detailed, I kept marveling that anyone could have all of that in their brain much less put it on paper so beautifully. Thanks for sharing it with us, is all I can say about talented authors like Ann.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent, a classic in the genre...
Review: I am not sure what 'older' readers will think of this book (from the review though, it seems you do!)...Anyway, I myself am only 13 years old...I have always liked reading about werewolves, vampires, magic, horror, etc, even though most of the teen books are fairly inadequate examples of the category.

I first saw this as a movie. My mother actually told me that it was on, casually, and it seemed like something I would like. I watched it without really watching it; I was mostly playing my pc, but the next time I saw it I thought it was indeed very well made. So, anyhow, a big time lapse, and I am at an Eckerd's one day and I see it as a novel. I buy it, and my mother then expressively prohibits me to read further when I bring it home.

So, I was at the bookstore...and I picked it up. I don't know what drew me towards it, but for the longest time I brooded on simply buying it, reading a bit. My redeeming arguments were that I am more mature than most teenagers, and anyway, its not like they haven't put on television what they published before.

This was an infinitely long process for me. I buy it eventually, hiding it, loving it, and am instantly drawn into it. Rice is truly a master of manipulating the feelings, and giving her a characters a 3-D realism, so that all their motives seem justified, so that almost nothing sticks out as awkward or forced, or untrue to the character.

Her attention to detail, while long winded and rather boring at some points sculpts a full world for her characters. There is very little to criticize about her work, other than that I did find myself looking for lighter, happier moments. I waited and waited until I finally realized the book's depressing tone isn't just temporary. This was certainly disappointing, I wish that just once there was a point, if only briefly, where you can rest without being bogged down by the sorrowful tone.

I finished it today. In some places, I feel the movie version is slightly better, like the ending (I will not give away either version's, though). However it was certainly much better that in the book we can experience all the movie's trivial characters, like Santiago and Madeleine and the theatre's vampires. Rice truly creates a fully-dimensional, self-sustained world.

I would probably not recommend this book to any of my peers simply because of certain, highly sexual scenes, though no actual description, even of kissing. Most were not, granted, however there is definitely a maturity issue involved.

A great book, truly a classic, for matured audiences.