Reviews - The Vampire Lestat

2.65k reviews for:

The Vampire Lestat

Anne Rice

3.99 AVERAGE

purplebunny9157's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Loveable characters: Yes

eliza_cat's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous dark emotional slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

emmavonb's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

kiwisandher's review against another edition

4.0

Not only did it feel completely separate from the first book, the framing device and the main story felt completely separate from each other-but I still liked it is the thing!!

There are long, poetic passages of Anne Rice wrestling with her own concepts of good and evil that are great philosophical bon mots surrounded by unhinged vampire lore she’s clearly making up on the spot but that’s stunningly inventive and compelling. Somehow it works!

While the vampires are sympathetic, they are also repulsive and I’m not sure that was the author intent (or how many fans read it), but for me it’s what makes the philosophies they present that much richer. If the first book was about the evils of apathy, this one starts with unveiling the trap of believing that beauty is inherently good before questioning the binary of good/evil entirely. Lestat at the outset believes that the pursuit of beauty is the only measure of good man can hope to achieve in a nihilistic world (or Savage Garden as he calls it), but comes to decide that since nothing matters at all beauty is equally pointless and only the chaos of provoking an eternal, immortal war will bring anything close to meaning to his actions. I’m excited for Queen of the Damned!

in_thegrid's review against another edition

3.5

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

glazerdonut's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

I’m genuinely speechless. I’m obsessed. I’m obsessed. I’m obsessed.

gracereadswest's review against another edition

3.75

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

I honestly cannot decide if I like Anne Rice as an author. This book is by far better than Interview With The Vampire, but Rice’s prose and exposition is so slow! It’s worth a read but unless you love her writing be prepared for this one to take some time to get through. Lestat is truly the hero of these books because he is far more interesting than Louis. The incorporation of new characters like Gabrielle, Magnus, Marius, Enkil and Akasha truly lead this tale and kept me reading it. I’m hoping that in Queen of the Damned we can see more of Lestat’s personality shine through like we did when he made his first appearance in San Francisco in this book.