BOOK | FICTION | HORROR
THE LESSER DEAD
CHRISTOPHER BUEHLMAN
AUDIOBOOK
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
The secret is, vampires are real and I am one.
Amazon Book Description
The secret is, I’m stealing from you what is most truly yours and I’m not sorry…
New York City in 1978 is a dirty, dangerous place to live. And die. Joey Peacock knows this as well as anybody—he has spent the last forty years as an adolescent vampire, perfecting the routine he now enjoys: womanizing in punk clubs and discotheques, feeding by night, and sleeping by day with others of his kind in the macabre labyrinth under the city’s sidewalks.
The subways are his playground and his highway, shuttling him throughout Manhattan to bleed the unsuspecting in the Sheep Meadow of Central Park or in the backseats of Checker cabs, or even those in their own apartments who are too hypnotized by sitcoms to notice him opening their windows. It’s almost too easy.
Until one night he sees them hunting on his beloved subway. The children with the merry eyes. Vampires, like him…or not like him. Whatever they are, whatever their appearance means, the undead in the tunnels of Manhattan are not as safe as they once were.
And neither are the rest of us.
Except for the originals — Shelley’s Monster; Stoker’s Dracula; Stevenson’s Mr. Hyde, etc. — when it comes to horror, regardless the medium, whether it be movies or books (although, nightmares get a pass — nothing like a good monster trying to chase me down and rip me to shreds in my dreams), I typically will give a hard pass to any story with a monster in it. Not sure why… maybe because I find that most are just too goofy to suspend reality enough for me to enjoy them.
But I tell you what, I love Christopher Buehlman’s monsters like no man should ever love a monster.
THE LESSER DEAD is my third book by Buelhman — THOSE ACROSS THE RIVER and SUICIDE MOTORCYCLE CLUB are the other two and both are outstanding reads in their own right. However, by comparison, TLD is a completely exceptional read, a pure literary masterwork, not just as a genre novel, but as a true literary novel. But even regarding it just as a horror novel, by comparison with its angsty and vulgar (vampire) coming of age vibe to it, I would say it ranks as the THE CATCHER IN THE RYE of its genre if I didn’t think TCITR was so grossly over rated. But regardless, to me TLD, although a much more complete body of work than TCITR in my opinion, deserves such similar acclaim among its contemporaries as TCITR enjoys among its. Not to mention TLD has an ending that is pure literary genius.
As if that weren’t enough, Buehlman himself narrates the audiobook and his skills as a voice actor are equal to his skills as an author.
The dude’s for real folks.
#whythefhaventanyofthisdudesbooksbeenmadeintoamovie
Featured image courtesy of Goodreads