Friday 23 December 2011

Vampires and more

It's no surprise that I like Vampire novels (now I am most definitely not talking about Twilight vampires here but the Anne Rice and Poppy Z Brite Vampires - real fictional vampires). I have quite a few novels from these authors and more which cover the subject but the one that had a profound effect on me as a late teen I have never owned...

Lost Souls, by Poppy Z Brite.

Zles, a good friend of mine, had this and knew that I would love it as much as he did so he loaned it to me... I remember reading it fast, almost gorging myself on it every night. Staying up far too late to just get another page into the story - to learn more about the characters, the vampires, the sexuality, the horror and Chartreuse.

It was so well written I remember thinking it spoke to me... and the characters where part of me or was I of them... romantic silly teenage dreams? Probably, and this book could be blamed for my and Zles's experimentation with Chartreuse... so much Chartreuse...

But why if I loved this book so much did I knew read it again? Never buy it? I'm not sure, maybe the memory of the experience reading could have blurred the lines between reality and fantasy... maybe.

Recently Darklyss borrowed Drawing Blood - knowing that I read Poppy's books. This is the follow on novel from Lost Souls a kinda of sequel in a way, set in the same universe and with some of the same characters read about in Lost Souls... and it got me thinking about re-reading Lost Souls...

I realised that enough time has past for me to be able to read it again I am old enough to not have too high an expectation. I remember the rose coloured world my teenage self saw things and I know that I have not always been right...

After nearly 2 months wait to get the book ordered in... (another post I fear) I started reading it last night... The Prologue dragged me back in - I felt the same joy I felt when I first read it all those years ago.

Christian, The Bar, The Trinity of Vampires and the birth of Nothing... I'm not sure that this will last for the whole book - maybe it is a touch of reminicing of nights lieing on my bed in the dim dark listening to the Cure... maybe it's the Chartreuse of yesteryear flowing through my veins but I fucking love this book...

Please if you have a book, a story, a novel, hell even a movie that moved you once long ago... try to read/watch it again... you just might find you love it all over again...

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