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oraclereadings 's review for:
The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires
by Grady Hendrix
Starting the new year with some horror.
So I had some ups and down with this and I'm going to struggle with giving this a reasonable rating.
Our story follows married mother, Patricia Campbell, being dissatisfied with her things are going in her average, stay-at-home life. During the very beginning, we see that Patricia and a few of her neighbors (more housewives) have grown bored with the dull book club meetings and decide to start their own little group featured around <b>true crime</b>. Patricia finds excitement in the stories and even admits that she wishes for something more adventurous to happen in their boring, suburban life.
<img src="https://infostockpile.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/tumblr_nfghuinmk61s5n19go1_400.gif" width="340" height="100" alt="description"/>
Patricia is involved in an assault not too long after that. An elderly woman that lives in the neighborhood attacks her, going as far as biting Patricia's earlobe off.
Coincidentally, the event follows around the same time that James Harris, who claims to be the woman's distant relative, moves into her house. James quickly becomes popular with the neighborhood and Patricia finds herself taking a sudden interest in him. The man has an insane amount of money (in cash!), and he rarely goes out during the day because of an eye condition.
At the sudden and mysterious death of Patricia's mother-in-law, along with black children going missing and even dying from suicide, Patricia starts to suspect James. She loses her trust for him but cannot convince her friends and family to do the same.
The only horror that I found in this book was the blatant misogyny, sexism, racism, and gaslighting that took place. <i>The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires</i> is set in the 90's, but if I didn't know any better I would have guessed that we were reading about a book taking place in the fifties instead. I found it odd that none of the women had jobs, not a single one except for our only black character.
I haven't found a review on here that mentions CSA (child sexual assault) on here and that was something else that I just found unnecessary. It happens a few times on page and is described pretty heavily, to the point where I had to skip some paragraphs just to get past that point. The worst part is that neither of the characters acknowledge it as being more than just an ordinary assault. I understand it's part of the story process, but come on. Another character gets raped, off page, and we go into all sorts of detail talking about how that affected the character and everyone else around them. But nobody talks about the kids having to go through that.
One last thing I want to talk about is just me ranting about the type of vampire that is displayed in this book. The description matches closely to the vampires that are portrayed in the TV series <i>The Strain</i>, with a tentacle like appendage coming out of their mouths. All forms of media have their own portrayals of vampires and that is a very specific kind of vampire. Unfortunately, I am very picky about my monsters and I do not consider that to be a vampire.Which made me excited when James even states "I'm not a vampire." but then we never get a clear definition of what species he does identify as.
Unfortunately there were just too many issues for me to "like" this book.
So I had some ups and down with this and I'm going to struggle with giving this a reasonable rating.
Our story follows married mother, Patricia Campbell, being dissatisfied with her things are going in her average, stay-at-home life. During the very beginning, we see that Patricia and a few of her neighbors (more housewives) have grown bored with the dull book club meetings and decide to start their own little group featured around <b>true crime</b>. Patricia finds excitement in the stories and even admits that she wishes for something more adventurous to happen in their boring, suburban life.
<img src="https://infostockpile.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/tumblr_nfghuinmk61s5n19go1_400.gif" width="340" height="100" alt="description"/>
Patricia is involved in an assault not too long after that. An elderly woman that lives in the neighborhood attacks her, going as far as biting Patricia's earlobe off.
Coincidentally, the event follows around the same time that James Harris, who claims to be the woman's distant relative, moves into her house. James quickly becomes popular with the neighborhood and Patricia finds herself taking a sudden interest in him. The man has an insane amount of money (in cash!), and he rarely goes out during the day because of an eye condition.
At the sudden and mysterious death of Patricia's mother-in-law, along with black children going missing and even dying from suicide, Patricia starts to suspect James. She loses her trust for him but cannot convince her friends and family to do the same.
The only horror that I found in this book was the blatant misogyny, sexism, racism, and gaslighting that took place. <i>The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires</i> is set in the 90's, but if I didn't know any better I would have guessed that we were reading about a book taking place in the fifties instead. I found it odd that none of the women had jobs, not a single one except for our only black character.
I haven't found a review on here that mentions CSA (child sexual assault) on here and that was something else that I just found unnecessary. It happens a few times on page and is described pretty heavily, to the point where I had to skip some paragraphs just to get past that point. The worst part is that neither of the characters acknowledge it as being more than just an ordinary assault. I understand it's part of the story process, but come on. Another character gets raped, off page, and we go into all sorts of detail talking about how that affected the character and everyone else around them. But nobody talks about the kids having to go through that.
One last thing I want to talk about is just me ranting about the type of vampire that is displayed in this book. The description matches closely to the vampires that are portrayed in the TV series <i>The Strain</i>, with a tentacle like appendage coming out of their mouths. All forms of media have their own portrayals of vampires and that is a very specific kind of vampire. Unfortunately, I am very picky about my monsters and I do not consider that to be a vampire.
Unfortunately there were just too many issues for me to "like" this book.