The Book that Wouldn't End...

It is probably appropriate that Blood and Ice (Bantam Books, 2009; 675 pages), by Robert Masello is a vampire novel. More or less, anyway. Because it was the book that wouldn't end. It went on forever.

Sometimes I like that in a book. When it is a really good story, for instance. Other times...well, let's just say that I only finished this book because I had promised myself I would. I've got to quit doing that.

Now, it wasn't a bad book, exactly. It has an interesting premise: Vampires in the Antarctic. And it cuts back and forth between the story of the two vampires, who come from the mid-1800s, and how they got to be vampires, and the present-day story of the Antarctic research station where writer and photographer Michael Wilde has come to get his career as a journalist back on track and forget that his girlfriend is lying in the hospital in a persistent vegetative state after a climbing accident that he wasn't able to save her from. Only, I found the present-day story much more interesting than the story of Eleanor, a nurse with Florence Nightingale during the Crimean War, and Sinclair, the soldier who should have fallen during the Charge of the Light Brigade. We find out how they met, how they were parted, how they came back together. But we are given only the slightest hint about how they became vampires. Not all that interesting, at least to me.

The bigger problem with Masello's book was that the end was awfully anti-climactic. I won't say more about that, but while the journey was moderately diverting, the destination left a lot to be desired.

I only picked up Blood and Ice in the library because of the blurb on the front cover of the paperback edition, from USA Today, which described the book as "What would happen if H. G. Wells, Stephenie Meyer and Michael Crichton co-wrote a suspense novel." Sounded interesting. H. G. Wells was promising; whatever you thought of him personally, Michael Crichton did write books that kept me turning the pages, and I figured that the Stephanie Meyer reference meant vampires, and I do like vampire stories. Just not hers. Unfortunately, there was more Stephanie Meyer here than either Wells or Crichton.

Maybe that'll teach me to read cover blurbs, or at least to not take them seriously.

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Now, to catch up with what else I've been reading.

I finished my re-read of Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Hotel Transylvania (St. Martin's Press, 1978; 252 pages). A much better vampire novel than Masello's book. I had been going to write a joint review of the two books, but this is so much better than Masello's book that I couldn't even begin to compare the two.

If I recall my chronology correctly, this was the second of Yarbro's Count Saint-Germain novels, following The Palace, which I wrote about here previously. This one takes place in Louis XV's court in France, where Saint-Germain takes on a group of Satan-worshipers in order to save a beautiful and innocent girl whose father, a former member of the group, had promised to them to do with as they pleased. I don't love this novel as much as I love The Palace and some of Yarbro's other entries in this series, but it is a good book and I enjoyed the re-read.

I've also recently read a delightful Star Trek novel by Barbara Hambly, Ishmael (Pocket Books, 1985; 256 pages), which sends Spock back in time to the universe of another television series, "Here Come the Brides". I just recently became aware of the book, and considering that I was a fan of both shows as a young girl, I had to read it. If you have any fondness for either show, read this book. It captures the atmosphere of both of them very well, it tells a good story. And we find out something about Spock's ancestry that I found sort of delightful.

Hambly seems to have gotten the idea for the book from the fact that the same actor who played Spock's father in the series, Mark Lenard, also played the resident villain in Here Come the Brides. It was a good idea. Although I am a fan, I don't habitually read Star Trek novels. I'm very glad I read this one.

Another book I finished in the past week or so was Hangman (HarperCollins, 2010; 422 pages), by Faye Kellerman. Another good novel, one in her Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus series of police procedurals, some of which I've mentioned here in the past. Kellerman is one of my favorite writers, and this series continues to please.

This installment actually is the book preceding Gun Games, which I wrote about here a few weeks ago. It tells the story of how Gabe Donatti, the son of a physician and a hit man, came to live with Decker and Lazarus, at the same time Decker is investigating a series of murders that seem to point to there being a serial killer on the loose. Except that it very soon starts looking like there are two serial killers instead of one, operating independently. Decker and his team have to sort out the threads of that case at the same time he and his wife are trying to sort out whether or not offering Gabe a place to live is a good idea, considering his family situation, and as Decker gets ready to celebrate his 60th birthday.

As always, with Kellerman's books, I can just say, read it.

Reveiw: "The Palace", by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

Chelsea Quinn writes, among other things, vampire novels. But these are vampire novels with a twist: her vampire, the Count Saint Germain, is the good guy. So, if you like your vampires menacing, cruel, and villainous, you probably want to give The Palace (St. Martin's Press, 1978; 376 pages) a miss. But, if you like good writing, a great story, well-researched historical backgrounds, and vampires that don't sparkle, you'll likely enjoy Yarbro's series of vampire novels, most of which feature the Count.

The Palace is the second in the series, which has grown to a number of volumes since she wrote the first installment, Hotel Transylvania, which is also very good. But The Palace, which is the second book in the series, is my favorite, and the one I've gone back to read most often since I discovered these novels quite by accident. I was at the library, and just cruising the fiction stacks and pulled it off the shelf and read that it is set in Renaissance Florence. I'm a huge Michelangelo geek, so that was enough to get me to check the book out of the library and give it a chance; the fact that it was a vampire story was of secondary importance to me.

The story begins as Saint Germain, who is a friend to Lorenzo de'Medici, the unofficial ruler of Florence, is building a palace in Florence. But Lorenzo the Magnificent's health is failing, and Girolamo Savonarola, a Dominican monk whose fire and brimstone preaching comes with a heavy dose of guilt and prophecy, is starting to hold sway over more and more of Florence's population. Savonarola has predicted both that Lorenzo will die, and when, and that the French will come and try to rule the city. When both predictions come true, Savonarola is on his way to several years as the de facto dictator of the city.

This development makes it more and more difficult for Saint Germain to live in Florence, because along with more and more rigorous religious laws, foreigners are less and less tolerated. Finally, after the sister of Sandro di Filipepi, known to the art world as Botticelli, with whom Saint Germain has had an ongoing liaison, confesses her sins in a way that implicates the Count in her debaucheries, Saint Germain must flee the city. He returns, posing as his own nephew, to rescue his student, Demetrice, who has come to live with Saint German after the death of Lorenzo and because of her ties to him has been accused of heresy.

It is worth reading The Palace for the wonderful writing and exciting story alone. But besides good storytelling and history that is impeccably researched and woven into the story without the huge passages of info-dumping that so many historical novels suffer from, Yarbro has inserted into the story a major subtext regarding the dangers of excessive and fanatic religious devotion. She explores, without sacrificing story or storytelling, the dangers that can come when religious fervor overtakes good sense and mixes with politics.

Savonarola is presented as a sort of a Renaissance version of a televangelist, preaching doom and gloom and prophesying the end of the world, or at least the end of Florence. He insists that any pleasure is vanity and offensive in the sight of God. He urges detailed confessions of sins, especially those of a sexual nature. He demands that the citizens of the city destroy anything that isn't strictly utilitarian, that they wear drab plain clothes, and that they attend church and strictly observe all feast days. If you are not familiar with the career of Savonarola, as I was not when I first read The Palace, Yarbro's portrayal of him threatens to read like an anachronistic parody. It is not.

Long after my first reading of The Palace, I wrote a paper and did a class presentation on the career of Savonarola. As part of my research for that project, I read translations of some of the sermons Savonarola gave in Florence during the period in which the novel takes place, and the words that Yarbro puts in his mouth sound very much like the records of his sermons read. There is no exaggeration there, as far as I can see; he really was that fanatic, that judgmental, that full of fervor.

It is a mark of Yarbro's skill as a researcher and a writer that she has managed to insert this subtext, this social criticism, into The Palace without making it read like an historical treatise or a propaganda piece on the dangers of fanaticism of any sort. It is all integral to the story.

I will warn you of one thing. If you do read The Palace, there is a strong possibility that you will find yourself looking for other books in the series. I've not liked all of Yarbor's Saint Germain books as much as I like The Palace, but I've not regretted the time I've spent reading any of them.