Rating: 
Summary: Time To Nail This Coffin Shut
Review: Anne Rice said in an interview recently this was the final chapter in the vampire series. A series that started it's mythology back in the seventies, has spawned countless books, a movie, and even inspired a song by Sting. For those of you who watched "the X-Files", remember the last episode how it brought the mythology of the last nine seasons together including Mulder's abduction, Scully's baby, the cigarette smoking man, and the oil? This book is a little like that. A hodge podge of characters, it merges the entire vampire world with her world of the Mayfair witches. All that's missing from the mere 300 page book are a few castrati from "Cry to Heaven" and a mixed race Creole from "Feast of All Saints",and we'd have had her whole literary canon represented. Thankfully Lestat is back to narrate, and he's at least entertaining. After the melodramatic mess of "Blackwood Farm" she could only go up. But c'mon, (spoiler alert here), to have Lestat and Rowan fall helplessly gaga over each other seems cheap and trivial. One of the great things about "Interview" and "Lestat" was this world of the vampires she created. It was timeless. Now the books are infused with so much of modern culture (faxes, email, Dixie Chick references) it loses it's-well to be redundant-timeless appeal.The writing is also lazy. The first chapter concludes with the script term: "smash cut" to signify a fast scene change. I think Anne Rice was once a great writer, and Lestat is an amazing character. But these last few books have been so below par that I'm ready for it to be laid to rest.
Rating: 
Summary: not as good
Review: Blackwood Farm was excellent and i was very excited about blood canticle. Unfortunately it wasnt one of Anne Rice's best. Read it, but dont expect much. And Mona, what an irritating character.
Rating: 
Summary: once again, disappointed!
Review: Anne why do we need to know the history of Taltos AGAIN! When it has been mentioned in "Lasher"!!! I can't get her concept anymore. And what makes it even more sad is that this book is the last of the chronicles. Well, I think it's for the better because the Chronicles have been so sour these past years that it's hard to remain a fan. Once again Anne, GET AN EDITOR FOR YOUR BOOKS!!! PLEASE!!!!
Rating:
Summary: BLOOD CANTICLE LAST OF THE CHRONICLES?
Review: ALTHOUGH I AM A BIG FAN OF ANNE RICE, I WAS SAD TO HEAR THAT THIS BOOK IS THE LAST IN THE VAMPIRE CHRONICLES,AND SO I THAUGHT IT WOULD BE A TERRIFIC READ,LIKE BLACKWOOD FARM,UNFORTUNEATELY I FOUND THE BOOK TO BE LACKING IN SUSPENSE AND VERY PREDICTABLE FROM BEGINNING TO END.LESTAT'S INTRODUCTION IN THE FIRST CHAPTER WAS ANNOYING, AND REPEATITIVE.,WHERE IS THE BRAT PRINCE? HE BECAME A CATHOLIC.AND HIS DREAM TO BE A SAINT WAS TOO PLAYED OUT.I ALWAYS LOVED LESTAT AND HE JUST KIND OF SEEMED OUT OF IT THROUGHOUT THE BOOK.THE BOOK HAS VERY LITTLE HORROR TO IT AT ALL AND THE PLOT, TO ME SEEMED VERY LAME AND UNINTERESTING.I LIKE THE IDEA OF THE WITCHES AND VAMPIRES,ALWAYS DID,REMEMBER DARK SHADOWS? BUT THERE ARE TOO MANY LOOSE ENDS AND NO CLOSURE AT ALL .I FEEL SO LET DOWN,SO MANY UNANSWERED QUESTIONS,ESPECIALLY IF THIS IS THE LAST OF THE CHRONICLES!MAYBE THIS BOOK WAS A DREAM AND ANNE CAN WAKE UP AND START AGAIN!IS ANNE RICE SELLING US OUT? THE QUEEN OF THE DAMNED MOVIE WAS A LET DOWN ,NOW THIS!AT LEAST WE HAVE THE PREVIOUS BOOKS,OUR BELOVED VAMPIRES ARE LOST TO US IN THIS BOOK ,LOUIS IS MENTIONED ONCE BY LESTAT (SARCASTICLY AS A COWARD)OTHER THAN THAT IT SEEMS ANNE HAS BEEN DRAINED DRY AND LEFT US GUESSING,IF IT WAS ANNE RICE WHO WROTE IT ,I SERIOUSLY WONDER,BECAUSE I CANNOT RELATE TO THIS BOOK,NOR THE CHARACHTERS IN IT.I WANT THE REAL LESTAT BACK AND A REAL BOOK TO FOLLOW THIS ONE ,LETS HOPE ANNE HEARS OUR CALL AND DELIVERS, TILL THEN WE CAN THIRST FOR A READ THAT HAS SOME BLOOD FLOWING THROUGH THE HEART OF IT.
Rating:
Summary: The characters deserved better
Review: What can I say about this book that hasn't already been said by other reviewers? This has to be the worst book Rice has written, and it took an act of will for me to finish it. Rice has said that this is the last of her Vampire Chronicles. I only hope she keeps her word.So why is this book so bad? First of all, the story is thin. Newly made vamp Mona Mayfair (who spends most of the book acting out) wants to find out what happened to her Taltos child. Ok, interestng premise. Could have made for a good story. Mayfair family dynamics come into play--Mona's duaghter was fathered by Rowan's husband Michael and Mona's mad at Rowan. Could have been interesting. Oncle Julien haunts Lestat because he's mad that Mona has been vamped. Interesting idea. There are other glimmers of a plot that could work, but mostly they get a superficial, breakneck treatment that reads more like the outline of a longer, more developed novel. However, my major complaint about "Blood Canticle" (and much of Rice's recent work) is her treatment of her characters. In her earlier works, they were better fleshed out and more complex. In other words, they were believable, and from book to book Rice maintained their integrity. In recent books, however, she's turned them into one dimensional cartoon characters that bear only a superficial resemblance to what they used to be. She manipulates them like puppets to suit her whims--disposing of them off-handedly when it suits her fancy (poor Ash, poor Morrigan, poor Merrick--oops, wrong book). Her characters have lost any psychological reality they originally had. For instance, Mona's just an spoiled, immature brat; Rowan's a controlling Mad Scientist who wants to leave her husband for Lestat; and Quinn (Rice's best developed recent character) is so bland he fades into the woodwork. Even Oncle Julien becomes a incompetent ghostly meddler who can't get anything right. As for Lestat, now he's a do-gooder who wants to become a saint. You know the book is in trouble when it begins with Rice using Lestat's voice to whine about how "Memnoch the Devil" was misunderstood. Much of the Vampire Chronicles has been about Lestat's moral evolution, but please, give the vamp his fangs back! Part of the problem here is that Rice has written some very good books that conveyed a real sense of the uneartly. "Blackwood Farm," Rice's most recent book before this one, was downright creepy and spooky in spots. Even "Merrick" had an eerie atmosphere to it. "Blood Canticle" suffers in comparison and does justice to neither of her major series. Both deserved a better sendoff. Vampires & Mayfairs alike, may you rest in peace and be subjected to no further indignities.
Rating:
Summary: Possibly The Worst Book Ever Written
Review: This book was a waste of the paper it was written on. Save your
money and just read one of her older and better books again.
Rating:
Summary: One Word - Horrible
Review: This book is the worst thing Anne Rice has written since Violin. I'm a huge fan of Anne Rice and own most of her books in hardback, but i'm thinking of trashing this one. I couldn't even get through it. Her attempts at making it easier to read have taken all of the magic out of the book. Lestat appears to be a babbling fool instead of the cool, sophisticated, yet mischievous brat that we've come to adore. Lestat's language has sunk low enough that he sounds like a parent trying to speak teenager (those annoying commercials?) As big of a fan as i've been, i actually feel insulted by this book. If Anne Rice cares about her readers at all, she will completely rewrite this book.
Rating:
Summary: Bloody "Canticle"
Review: "Blood Canticle" is reportedly the last of the Vampire Chronicles. If that is so, then the series dies with a whimper rather than a bang. Rice manages to wrap up several threads from her two sprawling series (one about vampires and one about witches), but the plot itself is limp and doesn't handle everything it should. "Blood Canticle" picks up where the last book left off: Lestat has just turned the dying nymphet Mona Mayfair into a vampire, thus saving her life... or rather, saving her un-life. No sooner is Mona a vampire than Lestat receives an unusual visitor: Rowan Mayfair, a brilliant witch and neurosurgeon, who has come to take back her formerly ill cousin. Lestat manages to get her to go away, only to receive some other unwelcome visitors. Oncle Julian Mayfair, now dead, is ticked off that Lestat has kept Mona from dying. Mona and her lover Quinn move into Lestat's apartment with him, as Mona adjusts to being a vampire. But there is a part of Mona's life that she can't leave behind: her "Walking Baby," a Taltos child named Morrigan who vanished shortly after being born. With the help of Rowan and her husband Michael, Lestat begins unraveling the mystery of the Taltos -- and the bloody consequences of their flight. It's never a good sign when your hero (or anti-hero) starts talking weirdly on the first page. But after Lestat announces "I don't deconstruct nothin'" and "It's time to boogie!" in the first chapter, something seems to be wrong. His grandiose fantasies of sainthood are interesting, but Rice using him to criticize those who disliked "Memnoch the Devil" is not. For awhile after that, Rice seems to be on steadier ground for the first third of the book, in which Lestat gets his young charges used to being vampires. Her prose is languid and sensuous. Some scenes -- like attacking a pair of child-abusing psych-vampires -- sizzle with tension and emotion. But when the Taltos plot gets going, things unravel fast. The solution to the Taltos' problems is too pat and easy, and Lestat's preoccupation with sainthood, salvation and Juan Diego are a little distracting. They're understandable, but still distracting. Lestat himself seems to be in flux some of the time ("Yo"?) but enjoyable enough to read, although his flat semi-romance with Rowan seems like filler. Mona comes across as a hysterical, immature ex-Lolita, and Quinn really doesn't come across as anything. He's eclipsed by anybody else who is in the room with him. While Rice still writes beautifully and has the power to enspell, "Blood Canticle" tries to wrap up too much at once, and doesn't manage to wrap up enough. Limp and lackluster, and hopefully not really the end.
Rating:
Summary: Poor book to end the series
Review: I absolutley LOVE all books in The Vampire Chronicals until I purchased this one. I bought it because it was rumored to be the last in the series and boy, was I disappointed. There is no big climax and I found Lestat to be annoying and stupid in this book. I never thought THAT would be possible. I like the character Quinn because he reminds me a bit of Louis so I was glad that he was in this novel. Please save your $20-$25 and buy Blackwood Farm or another Anne Rice novel in the series. Let's pretend that Blood Canticle never happend.
Rating:
Summary: Not Surprised at all that this novel Sucked.
Review: For me Anne Rice lost her touch after The Tale of the Body Theif.Every book after that one has been a complete waste of time and so boring that your be on the brink of insanity before you finish. I finished this book strictly out of curiousity and nothing more.She uses annoying descriptions to much for one thing, Lestat being a saint is like the POPE being the anti-christ,it can't happen. Lestat murders as much as he every did in the other books as in this one.Fav characters like human-like Louis are a nonenity in this book and so are David,Marius,and Armand.She fills up the spaces that those vamps are supposed to be in with unlikable, boring,want to get a gun and shoot yourself characters like Mona, Rowan,Micheal,and the rest of the subcast.While I appluad her for making issues in her books about morally wrong things like incest, murder,gayness, and bisexuality,all those things are in this books somewhat, but this book is so not rice that all those things just sound more and more sicker than she ususlly protrays the. I almost cried at the ending. It was so boring, and uttery predictable that if I didn't borrow that book from the library I would have burned it. Her last books should have went out with a bang and with the characters we know and love from her other books, but instead it went out like a candleflame. I personly think anne wants to be a vampire, because she glorifies her hellbound, murderers, while still likable nonetheless, vampires like kings.(and if you go to IMDB and go to ANNE RICE and click on the title DOES ANYONE ELSE GET THE FEELING ANNE RICE WANTS TO BE A VAMPIRE your see what I have to say on that subject.)Quinn is slightly likable in BLACKWOOD FARM because his personality is like Louis, but in this book he is as boring as the rest and so is Lestat. Sorry Anne,but the sun had already settled on your novels long before you wrote this one.
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