Rating: 
Summary: Stake it!
Review: I read Interview and Lestat back before I was in high school.
I'm glad I stopped there. I opened this one up at the bookstore and was offended by line 3. If you respect yourself, put that baby back on the shelf. Stake it there.
Rating:
Summary: One Word: Bad
Review: This book is a sad, pathetic end to an otherwise exceptional series. The characters are flat and the story boring. Like Blackwood Farm, Rice pulls from both the Vampire and Mayfair Chronicles, but it just doesn't work. Great characters like Lestat, Rowan Mayfair, Michael Curry, and the pugnacious Mona are weak, crazed, and/or boring. By the time I finished this "novel," I felt nothing for the characters. They neither grew nor moved forward. Lestat's obsession with Rowan Mayfair seems forced, the Taltos story is a major letdown, and the ending just sucked. If this is truly the end of the Vampire Chronicles and the Lives of Mayfair Witches, we (and the characters) got screwed.I have been a fan of Ms. Rice since first discovering Interview with a Vampire and have devoured her novels since. Some have not always been satisfying (Memnoch being a good example), but I've always come back for more. Now, I'm not so sure. If she chooses to write something different, it will have to be damn good for me to lay down $25 for it.
Rating:
Summary: Shockingly Stupid
Review: If you haven't burned numerous piles of her books before, this one will have you reaching for the zippo in the first three pages. Not only does Rice use her world famous vampire Lestat as a puppet/mouthpiece in her first chapter to berate her fans for not understanding "Memnoch", but she then has him indulge in fantasies such as the Pope himself bowing to The Saint Lestat. Granted being a Saint ain't too hard nowadays, many a fan will have their own military campaign of shock and awe come down upon them when they read this trite little bitter novel. Throughout, it's as though Rice is using it as a final slap in the face to her withering fans, treating them as though they're idiots by the masses and she is the mythic god-writer who we "don't and can't understand." The book does little to nothing to "wrap up" the threads of vampires she has running around in her books. Most of her vampire characters are left to the reader's imagination to figure out what happened to them - this probably being a better option. Just don't write these imagined scenes down, as she'll sic her lawyers on you faster than you can scream for mercy, after which she'll calmly go back to selling gilded pencils that she once used to write notes on e-Bay. To add to the insult, she carries on about how she will now go to a place in writing where few fans will follow her. Simply put, if there were any fans left before this, this pompous "last Chronicle" novel assures that most will be deserters of the once glorious world of Rice.
Rating: 
Summary: OK, people. Let's take a deep breath. This is a good book!
Review: Having just finished this book, I had to put down in words my dismay at all the reviews that blasted it. I understand why some people don't like it. This is not the Lestat they thought they knew. The style of the story is different. And there are none of the friends we have come to know and love, like Louis, Armand and Marius. But if you stop and think back over the whole Vampire Chronicle series, you will see that this book (hopefully not the last as Anne Rice has said) was inevitable. Lestat wants to be a saint; He tells us this almost from the very beginning. He talks about it as if there was nothing left for him to be but a saint. This is not the Lestat we have seen in some of the other Chronicle books. That Lestat was seen as evil, and as "Cain, the slayer of my brother". But you have to remember that Lestat's words have only been used in four of the previous nine books. Louis told us the story in Interview with the Vampire, Armand told his own story, David told us of Merrick, Marius gave us the rest of his tale in Blood and Gold, and Quinn Blackwood told us the story of Blackwood Farm. When these others talked of Lestat, they were not using his words, his style. Blood Canticle is the first book to use Lestat's own words since Memnoch the Devil. And why wouldn't he have changed his manner of speaking in that time? Lestat is the one who, learning from the example of Marius, always found a way to fit in with the times he was living. So one of the lines is the book ends with !!!!!!! Isn't that the way people do things today in the world of Internet chat and email? Why should we be surprised that Lestat is doing it? As for his wanting to be a saint, think back in the Chronicles to a time someone said, "As we get older, we do not really change. We just become more and more ourselves". Re-read The Vampire Lestat. Since he was a child, Lestat dreamed of being a saint. As he gets older, and becomes more and more himself, his earliest dreams and desires would surely come back stronger than ever. I won't talk of the story, because the story tells itself. It is a typical book in the Vampire Chronicles in that for the first little while, you may be confused, thinking nothing is happening in sequence, or meshes with anything else in the story. But then it all starts coming together, as it always does, and you have trouble putting it down. This is not the best of the Chronicles (See Memnoch the Devil). Nor is it the worst. It may not be the best way to end the series (if it is truly finished), but it a very good story, a very good read, and is very true to the Lestat we saw in The Vampire Lestat, Queen of the Damned, The Tale of the Body Thief and Memnoch the Devil. This character has grown into the times. And that's what is making people say this is a bad book; He's not the same. Good for him! This is not a bad book. It's good book. I enjoyed it thoroughly.
Rating: 
Summary: Loyal Fan
Review: I am a bit mad at the fact that this is the last chronicle but I really cant believe that, even if she says it is so; she left it all too unfinished.I lived through menoch the devil and I can live through this. . . i hope. Sorry if i have made any of you mad but honestly i dont care!
Rating:
Summary: Wow! This book is awful...
Review: "Blood Canticle" is the worst kind of popular fiction. It is a product. It is Random House and Anne Rice hoping that people will buy it simply because it is a Vampire Chronicle. But is absolutely the worst novel that I have ever read. Anne Rice has always been hit (Queen of the Damned) or miss (Blackwood Farm). But "Blood Canticle" is so bad that it defies even being cataorgized as a miss. Stupid, incoherent, and mind numbingly insipid, this book should be propping up the missing leg on your sofa. Characters are eviscerated. Well developed plot lines from previous novels are thrown away in a sloppy attempt to put to rest subject matter Anne Rice is bored with. It is so insulting and so base that will not ever waste my time with another Anne Rice novel.
Rating:
Summary: Jarringly Unprofessional
Review: Blood Canticle delivers a startling double-shot of literary unprofessionalism. First, Anne Rice uses her most beloved character to berate and insult her fanbase for not appreciating her 1995 release, Memnoch the Devil. In his half-coherent rant, Lestat points out that Memnoch sold more copies than any other book in the series. Were those numbers really a surprise to anyone? After all, the film version of Interview with the Vampire had become a huge hit only months before. But apparently (at least in Anne's mind), most of those books went to idiots who didn't bother to understand its importance. So yes, Anne, insult us. Insult the readers who have kept up with your work for a decade or more, because we obviously just don't appreciate you. Never mind that literature is, by nature, always open to interpretation. We didn't read Memnoch the way you wanted. We deserve to be berated by the Brat Prince. Please. Oh, and the second unprofessional element in Blood Canticle? Rice follows up that rant with a novel that's practically unreadable. Characters act entirely differently than in past books (and that's not character development -- that's simple inconsistency). A few of the luckier characters have disappeared completely, thus escaping this soapy car wreck of a narrative. And what in the world happened to Lestat's written voice? He used to turn a charming phrase; now he speaks and writes like a half-literate teenager. I hope Anne keeps her promise and makes Blood Canticle the last book in the series. Her once-great characters deserve to rest in peace, if this sort of book is the best she can manage for them otherwise.
Rating: 
Summary: Is it really over?
Review: I am a loyal fan of Anne Rice. I've only just started reading her books about a year and a half ago, but I feel I'll never find a more talented author.
Blood Canticle is said to be Anne Rice's last novel in the Vampire Chronicles, but I can't seem to believe it. Too much is left unsaid, unresolved. Lestat is still struggling to obtain sainthood, Maharet's life story between the time she became a vampire until Queen of the Damned is still a mystery, and what has become of all the other characters that once played a prominent role in Anne Rice's magnificient novels.
Even with all these questions left unanswered, she still manages to tie up a few loose ends with Mona's reunion with the Taltos and the future of Blackwood Farm.
There was something that seemed a little off in this book. I felt confined while reading it. One of the things I love most about Anne Rice's novels is that each one is a journey through time from the viewpoint of a different individual. This book didn't do that. It stayed right here in the present time. Also, while reading it, you think a lot is happening but after completeing the book you realize that not too much really did. I don't like how Rowan became so weak and that her love for Michael is disappearing (Most likely because I am also currently reading the Witching Hour). Mona doesn't seem to pay that much attention to Quinn anymore either. And even Quinn himself doesn't seem to do too much in the book.
All in all, it's a decent novel but I feel that it lost some of the old charm that the other novels had.
Rating:
Summary: Do I really have to give it a star?
Review: I love Anne Rice. Everytime she had a book coming out, I would be the first to check it out online. My sister loved her, too, but I think I loved her more. The Vampire Chronicles were and still are some of the best books I have ever read. That is, until Blood Canticle came out. I can't express the sadness that swept over me when I discovered that this would be the last of my beloved Vampire Chronicles. Then I actually read it. What happened? Part of the allure of the Vampire Chronicles was that it breathed poetry and life into a subject that had been previously ignored by all other authors. Anne Rice wove a tapestry, a true world filled with the the undead that varried so greatly that you couldn't help but loved each and every single one of them. You could go on for pages without someone saying a word, just a calm peaceful time that could be used to describe the way the moonlight looked on the Mississippi River. Now you can't. It seemes every page is perferated with some trite meaningless diaglouge with some lame character. Lestat says, "Dude"? and, "Yo"? I'm sure I know some fifth graders that wouldn't even consider using such immature language in thier writting. Why does Anne Rice, one of the most sophisticated authors in the world, use such stupid words? And where are the other vampires? Louis, Armand, Daniel, David, Pandora, Marius, Santino, and every other vampire that ever showed his or her face in the novel? I love the Coven. Where are they? How could Lestat abandon those he had once loved so much? Lestat needs to be fixed. First he rants at us in a ridicules way, then he falls head over heels in love with a mortal he would have killed had he been in the right state of mind, and he abondoned the greatest vampire that ever came into being. Lestat! What's wrong with you? Where's the vampire that authored the best of the Vampire Chronicles? I understand that you went through HEaven and Hell, but surly that could hardly tarnish the vampire we all loved! In conclusion, all I have to say is WHY?!? If Anne is reading this by some divine miricale, please write another book! Make us believe in Vampires like you made us do with all the other novels. Bring back all the other vampires, including Lestat (ther real one that is), and delve back into that world of the living dead that we all adored so much.
Rating:
Summary: SHOULD HAVE LISTENED TO LESTAT!
Review: Lestat advises us to skip chapter one if we are unhappy in our reading. Should have listened, skipped that chapter and all others.This ends my love affair with the Vampire Chronicles, which honestly provided me with great pleasure over the years. Seems to me the Publisher should have had some sense of decency. There is no mistaking this book for anything other that a childish,amateurish attemmpt to capitalize on a "name" author.Someone inform the publisher that it's perfectly ok, and even preferable to turn down an inferior effort..moreover, a service to the public. Kind of tarnishes the pleasant memories I have of Ms. Rice's prior efforts. Anyone reading this review, take Lestat's advice..skip chapter one..then skip the rest.
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