Source - Goodreads
For years supernatural stories and movies have given us creeps. And as their legend continues to frighten and fascinate people world-wide its popularity in fiction keeps increasing.
Numerous countries and cultures have their own deviations of such similar folkloric entities. However, all vampire tales have a key commonality- lust for human blood. It was not until the 19th century that their popularity as literary subjects started to grow immensely.
No one really paid attention to the vampire books in the early 90’s and it wasn’t until the Twilight series that there was another huge explosion.
Introduction
Book’s Name - Vampire Stories
Complied By - Alan Durrant
Genre - Fiction, Supernatural, Horror
Language - English
Synopsis - Spoiler Alert!
This spine tingling collection brings together the most celebrated creatures in classic horror fiction where vampires and werewolves prowl the pages of this book in various weird and wonderful stories from masters of the genre.
The book starts with an interesting sneak peek into one of the most famous legends of all times - the ‘Dracula’ by Bram Stoker.
Some of these tales you may already have encountered – for example, ‘Gabriel-Ernest’ and ‘The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire’, which features the most celebrated detective, Sherlock Holmes.
Many of the stories, however, you probably will not have come across before. They encompass a wide time span, from the medieval French legend of ‘The Werewolf’ to the writer’s own story ‘Howl’.
About the Author
Source - Tiny Owl
Alan Durant is a British author of books of a wide age-range, from picture books to top-end teenage thrillers. He worked as a publicist and a copywriter for Walker Books before becoming a full time writer.
His first books were inspired by teenage experiences but since then he has written on science fiction, poetry, thrillers, non-fiction, etc. having written over 100-odd books.
He has also been a National Reading Campaign Reading champion and visits various schools, libraries and festivals where he gives talks and runs writing workshops. He has won many awards for his picture books and children’s literature.
He is married with three children and lives in Brighton, England.
About the Book
The stories in the book don’t have any connection to each other as the book entails a compilation of a few stories from some famous authors of this genre, such as Angela Carter, Arthur Conan Doyle, Richard Matheson, Winifred Finlay, etc.
Overall the book is a short volume made more so by the author as he wanted to offer a blend of both petrifying creatures, where werewolves infect the vampire mix.
With the exception of one or two, all other tales in the book are thrillers that may invoke reactions like: wonder, shock, excitement and maybe sometimes even pity.
The Vampire Literature
The first literally on vampire appeared in 18th century poetry which was inspired by the life and legend of Lord Byron.
It was from the 20th century and slowly progressing into the 21st century, movies like Dracula Untold, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Van Helsing, Abraham Lincoln and the Twilight series that the trails of vampire fiction started to be described as romantic and elegant figures.
As more novels, series and movies were written and made, the vampires were often either the villain to be slayed or an appealing mystery that divided the perception of people where women became attracted to the dark, seductive and cold vampires.
Critical Analysis
Strangely, for a book with the title mentioning ‘Vampires’ it has only one or two vampire tales while the others are werewolf stories, but that is not the sole reason for me marking it down.
I had indeed enjoyed the shaggy mix of the stories but perhaps the author could have reflected the inclusion of werewolves in the title making it sound fascinating since ages we have all been attracted towards the ancient rivalry between the two supernaturals.
The reason for marking the book down and probably not having it on our shelves is because there are better compilation volumes.
Although this book contains some good ones but is little laden with obvious trodden choices like the Stoker tale and ‘The Sussex Vampire’ tale by Conan Doyle.
Famous Quotes
“And now my child, you may kiss her. Kiss her dead lips if you will, as she would have you do, if for her to choose.” - Van Helsing
“Much is possible to those who serve the Devil.” - The Priest
The Bottom Line
I was particularly taken by the tale ‘The Vampire of Kaldenstein’ by Fredrick Cowles- an interesting story of three vampires from which two of them could be destroyed leaving the third one with a lot of suspension towards the end of the tale.
The author has chosen the stories finely with magnificent illustrations by Nick Hard castle and each having a different style and content making it a spine-chilling pleasure to read. However, I would recommend buying other compilations or original books of the authors mentioned above for a better read and thrilling experience.
My ratings for the book - 3 on 5
Get your copy from Amazon - Vampire Stories
Written By - Umme-Aiman
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