eleasofia 's review for:

Memnoch the Devil by Anne Rice

3.5

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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this was... something. it starts off slow and stays slow until the last handful of chapters. so the pacing is consistent at least. as for the plot, obviously, lestat has to have a conversation with memnoch, but it doesn't begin until like the 40% mark. everything up until this point ties into the story and is somewhat meaningful, but (as always in these books) could've been kept shorter. the side characters once again get very, very fleshed-out stories. in previous books i sometimes really enjoyed that, but unfortunately not this time. i didn't care about roger and dora like at all. so far so good. what happens then is lestat's conversation with memnoch, which will excite you only if you're interested in reading a bible retelling/ reintepretation.  the focus is on

the ceation of the universe by god, satan's (or rather memnoch's) fall, the crucifixion of christ, descriptions of heaven and hell

, and it unsurprisingly discusses good and evil, the ever recurring theme in the vampire chronicles. i don't care much for religion, not even in the theoretical and educational sense, and this happened to be the second bible retelling i read this year, so i really wasn't that into it. it's well written, so if you're looking for this kind of book, i'm sure you'll love it, but it wasn't for me. so basically the people who said in their reviews that this book is bible fanfiction are right. everyone who said that it's as boring as marius' story telling... i actually enjoyed marius' story very much in comparison to this. memnoch as a character is actually interesting, but that doesn't make up for anything. the ending is good though. the moment the story gets back to what's happening in the real world, it gets interesting again. i liked the twist/ explanation of everything at the end.

and i loved that armand appeared again and was completely shocked at the end. this book made me question if i really want to immediately go on with the next book in the series, but with that ending i don't think i can wait.

and on one additional note,

i kept thinking that it's very unnecessary how often it's mentioned that lestat is attracted by dora's period blood, so i feel like i should've seen it coming when he actually "drank" it, but i just wish i wouldn't have had to read that.