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econsidine's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
If you liked the first book, I guarantee you will really like this second book. I've seen a lot of reviews characterize this as some kind of "redemption" or "justification" of Lestat, and it's not really that, nor is it a retelling of Interview with the Vampire--instead, it's essentially a prequel that makes the first book a lot more complex. It's also a lot more fun to read than the first (and I *liked* the first!) mainly because it's told by Lestat instead of Louis.
Lestat is a great narrator, particularly because he is horrible. He is a misogynist and a terrible friend, with a giant ego, a violent streak, and no impulse control. He's definitely got some kind of incestuous relationship going on with his mother. And he's also a literal monster and kills people all the time. There is no redeeming him--which feels very much on purpose--and yet Anne Rice makes you empathize with him all the same. She never lets you forget how much of a monster he is, but also makes it clear that he feels immense love and pain at the same time. It's a refusal to equate evil with unfeeling that I find refreshing. It can be easy, in both stories and in real life, to try and see abusers/criminals/perpetrators of harm as coldhearted, lacking in self-awareness, and detached from humanity, but that's not necessarily the case. People can be loving and smart and self-aware, passionate and well-intentioned and victimized themselves, and can still do horrible things and be forces for evil. And Rice makes both the evil and the love unavoidable parts of her characters.
As a book, it's also a historical adventure story, moving from Auvergne to Gaul to Egypt to San Francisco and a whole lot of other places in the middle. There's also a lot of other characters' stories in this one, despite the title. The book reads almost like interconnected short stories, which makes sense for a tale about immortals.
And I guess that brings me to the other thing that strikes me about this book, the immortality of it all. Like the first book, but even more so, this book has a lot of philosophical musings about immortality and making it all meaningful and who is best suited to continue raging against that dying light the longest. Really, it feels like a way to discuss how to make an actual mortal lifetime meaningful, with the maybe-easier-to-digest natural phases and metamorphoses of an eternal lifetime acting as comparison. It reads, to me, like something written by someone who is very worried about death and about making life count. Though maybe that is projecting a bit too much. Either way, there's a lot going on here and it hit home for me.
Lestat is a great narrator, particularly because he is horrible. He is a misogynist and a terrible friend, with a giant ego, a violent streak, and no impulse control. He's definitely got some kind of incestuous relationship going on with his mother. And he's also a literal monster and kills people all the time. There is no redeeming him--which feels very much on purpose--and yet Anne Rice makes you empathize with him all the same. She never lets you forget how much of a monster he is, but also makes it clear that he feels immense love and pain at the same time. It's a refusal to equate evil with unfeeling that I find refreshing. It can be easy, in both stories and in real life, to try and see abusers/criminals/perpetrators of harm as coldhearted, lacking in self-awareness, and detached from humanity, but that's not necessarily the case. People can be loving and smart and self-aware, passionate and well-intentioned and victimized themselves, and can still do horrible things and be forces for evil. And Rice makes both the evil and the love unavoidable parts of her characters.
As a book, it's also a historical adventure story, moving from Auvergne to Gaul to Egypt to San Francisco and a whole lot of other places in the middle. There's also a lot of other characters' stories in this one, despite the title. The book reads almost like interconnected short stories, which makes sense for a tale about immortals.
And I guess that brings me to the other thing that strikes me about this book, the immortality of it all. Like the first book, but even more so, this book has a lot of philosophical musings about immortality and making it all meaningful and who is best suited to continue raging against that dying light the longest. Really, it feels like a way to discuss how to make an actual mortal lifetime meaningful, with the maybe-easier-to-digest natural phases and metamorphoses of an eternal lifetime acting as comparison. It reads, to me, like something written by someone who is very worried about death and about making life count. Though maybe that is projecting a bit too much. Either way, there's a lot going on here and it hit home for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Torture, Body horror, Violence, and Blood
Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Toxic friendship, Animal death, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, Murder, Suicide, Suicide attempt, and Terminal illness
Minor: Sexual assault, Car accident, and Incest
Sexual assault clarification:
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