Rating: 
Summary: BITING INTO "BITE" AND "WOODS"
Review: Just finished this one last night. It is the best Laymon I've read so far. Suspensful, funny, scary, with loving, believable characters and a plot so intelligently drawn I couldn't keep my eyes away from the novel (read it in a day).
I say this with a big sigh of relief, for I didn't experience the same bliss over ... his earlier work. ... Thank heavens BITE put Laymon back on top, for I was beggining to wonder if my appreciation of his work had lessen. M. Boucher
Rating: 
Summary: Laymon's fantastic!
Review: A friend of mine introduced me to Laymon, and I'm really glad she did. Laymon is a fantastic storyteller. I read two of his books (reading a 3rd now) and I've loved all of his work. Bite has been called a vampire book...well...it's vampire lite. There's not a vampire all through it, but he "drives" the story. Here's a short summary. Cat and Sam are out to kill a vampire. That's the easy part. They spend the rest of the book trying to deal with the choices they've made. The characters Sam and Cat meet in the desert are interesting. Trust me, that's an understatement. All of the characers are complex and you can't help but to care for them, the good and the bad ones. Bite has so many plot twists and Laymon had such a nice writing style, it [pulls] the reader in, and won't let go. Laymon has such a refershing style, that he keeps the reader glued to the page. The literary world will miss Richard Laymon. He's a writer that had a speical gift. Reward yourself, pick up a Richard Laymon book.
Rating:
Summary: Suspense with a dash of Salt... Just how I like it
Review: Unlike many who have reviewed this book, I am not a big horror fan. I read eclectically, and some things just catch my eye. It was that way when I read my first Stephen King book, 'Salem's Lot', in 1984. It was that way when I found Anne Rice's 'The Vampire Lestat'in 1989. Just such a book was Bite, by Richard Laymon. It is both the first and the only book of his I have read.
I found Bite on the newstand rack of the K-Mart where I was taking photos in the studio, and needed something to read over a slow afternoon. I sometimes enjoy vampire stories; I flipped over 'Lestat' and the film 'The Lost Boys'. Horror novels don't scare me; the last one that really did was Pet Sematary, mostly becasue I had just been blessed with a beutiful son who just reminded me of Gage Creed. It was the possibility of losing him, which had never occured to me before, that made that book so horrific. So I really didn't expect to get truly frightened by 'Bite.'
Good thing, too. I was not scared. I didn't even really consider it a good suspense story. Not like 'Silence of the Lambs', which I read in one sitting and then didn't enter a room for the next four weeks without checkoing behind the doors. But all the same, I enjoyed the story. It struck a nerve. I couldn't put it down. I read half of it that afternoon, and finished it at work the next day. Then havinbg already read the stupid thing, I bought it and put it in my paperback collection.
'Bite' has all the qualities that make a decent yarn. It had some action, a little suspense, a twist ending. But what really kept me going was how it shaded over into black humor. In short, 'Bite'had what originally attracted me to slightly campy humor like 'Hudson Hawk' and 'The Fifth Element'. It wasn't afraid to make light of a bad situation, and its own characters' ability to make a bad situation worse by doing something stupid. At least, I hope that's what Mr. Laymon really intended. If he didn't mean to do it that way, I'll still enjoy the book, but I'll lose some respect for him. The characters seemed more real to me for doing a few dumb things. Things like I may have done in their place.
So if you enjoy that kind of humor, give 'Bite' a try. You might be pleasantly surprised.
Rating: 
Summary: Not his best book, but an entertaining read
Review: The storyline is simple, the caracters are delightful and there is a nice amount of gore featured in BITE(that will be appreciated by Laymon fans). This is however not one of his best books. When you are able to get your hands on ISLAND or AFTER MIDNIGHT (my personel favourite)you should not be reading BITE, as the storylines the caracters and the action in the other books are superior to BITE.But if you are a fan of Laymon already this is a must-read for you.
Rating:
Summary: A fast paced nightmare.
Review: Bite is a strange marriage of nightmare, sex, ultra-violent horror, buddy/road movie convention, and comedy of errors. Just when you think it can't get worst for our flawed heroes it does, a whole lost worse. "Is it even possible to get out of this alive?" worse, in fact. Pure roman noir pulp, yet oddly romantic, Bite starts off running and does not stop for a moment to catch its breath. Fans of generic vampire stories will no doubt be put off. Readers beware...Laymon IS NOT Anne Rice, or any other goth type writer that makes the perverse somewhat romantic. And, as is to be expected from Laymon, the human monsters are far, far worse than the inhuman ones. Worthwhile reading for those that love to gulp their poison down straight and fast. Others will be sorry they applied. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't even bother
Review: I couldn't even finish this book. After wading through page after page of two characters trying to dispose of a body, I was so bored I couldn't go on. Their actions were completely unrealistic and silly. If you've just killed someone and you're trying to figure out how to dispose of the body, do you think you'd be preoccupied with sex and fantasizing??? Laymon wrote like a 12-year old with raging hormones. I know his novels are known for their gratuitous sex and violence, but when the sex gets in the way of the story, it's too much. If you're looking for a good read, please look elsewhere...
Rating:
Summary: quite a ride!
Review: Richard Laymon has done it again! It's not what you might imagine from the title, but, if you read 'The Stake' then you won't be surprised. A great way to spend a few hours!
Rating:
Summary: A Short Story on Amphetamines
Review: This novel is somewhat unusual in that it really has the feel of a short story. There is not a great deal of "depth" here. This is the first Laymon book I have read, so I don't know whether or not the writing in this book is typical of Laymon's other works. In a way, this lack of depth works in Bite; this kind of tale would seem to require a brisk, off-the-cuff pace to it--otherwise, the reader would have too much time to question the things going on here. Basically, the protagonist drops everything and quickly agrees to help an old flame murder a "vampire" (while this vampire is indulging in carnal pleasures with this man's "true love"), and then agrees to haul the body out to the desert for some forgettable reason. Along the way, the couple ends up meeting three of the most unusual, unlikeable (and not in a good way) characters in the world, fighting with, for, and against them in turn, all the while facing ridiculous situations that could easily have been avoided. Of course, they still find time to pause from their bloody, exhausting efforts in order to "enjoy each other's company." I ended up hoping everyone in this book would die. As I try to describe this book now, it really does sound like a stupid, hackneyed premise. Action alone keeps this story going; when all is said and done, there is no real story here--just action. The reader is not going to learn any universal truths in this book (and this is not the author's intention, anyway), but Laymon does manage to keep your interest throughout by never letting the pace of the story slow down. This is a good read for people seeking entertainment; those who would approach this book with a more serious mindset will be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: This Is Not A Vampire Novel
Review: If you are looking for a good vampire story, this book is a waste of time. It is actually an only mediocre thriller about a couple of people being chased around the desert by a psycho-type. The vampire in the story is virtually incidential, playing almost no role except in the very beginning and the end. BEWARE! This book starts promisingly with an interesting vampire premise, but it is soon dropped for the thriller story line.
Rating:
Summary: I thought this was a horrible book!
Review: What a ludicrous plot: Sam's ex-girlfriend, someone he hasn't seen in 10 years, shows up on his doorstep one night in a bathrobe and tells him she needs him to come kill a vampire. He drops everything with hardly a question asked, goes to her house, kills the so-called vampire, and then for some reason they take a road trip with the dead man in the trunk of the car. They want to bury him away from where they live, you see, so they just go off on this jaunt . . . and run into the most macabre set of characters you're ever encountered in fiction. The ex-girlfriend, Cat, is supposed to be the love of Sam's life, but she came across as a disgusting, self-centered, exhibitionistic tramp. The ONLY reason I kept reading this book was because I kept hoping that Sam would WAKE UP and see how horrible she was and dump her in the desert. I enjoyed this author's "One Rainy Night", but as far as "Bite" goes, it was aptly named!
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