The Time Of The Vampires by various authors

This book is a collection of Vampire stories by 18 different authors, none of whom I have ever even heard of before. I think the editors anticipated Readers looking at the author list in the table of contents and saying: “Who?” because they felt the need to add little paragraphs about the authors immediately following each story. This was annoying to me. Other story collections I have read put the author information in the back of the book, where you can either look it up, or look at some of it, or, ignore it entirely if you want. With the author info immediately after the stories, it kind of comes across as a commericial break in between stories. Not something I wanted to look at, but, in my way anyway.

I was largely disapointed with this book. It feels like the editors went “Hey, everybody! Write me a vampire story for this collection! Let’s make some money!”, and most of the authors went. “Yes….well… I’ve actually been working on this totally different story. Perhaps I will just throw in a Vampire somewhere, and make it work anyway!”. The editors must have looked at what they got back from the authors, and thought, “Uh oh! A lot of these aren’t really about vampires much. I know! We will put them in chronological order! Then it will work!” And then they named the whole lot “Time of the Vampires”, thinking themselves rather clever, and called it a day. Only a few stories held my attention. Most of them I just dragged myself through, hoping they would suddenly improve. They didn’t improve.

Here are more details about some of the stories in this collection. I’m not going to mention them all, because many of them didn’t even stick in my mind very long after reading them. Just not that interesting.

Some were not really about Vampires:

“A Vision of Darkness” by Lois Tilton. A Vampire talks to Socrates. I’m not really clear on why. This was written in a very similar style to the book “The Illiad” and was difficult to follow. To me, this one was more about the style of the Greek tragedies than about Vampires. I almost gave up on the whole book after a taste of this first story.

“The Blood Of The Lamb” by Lillian Stewart Carl. Sister Catherine is about to lose the church and the convent to the rich English King who wants the land. Will she have the strength to live outside the convent? This story was very much about being a Christian and having faith in God to get you through life. The one Vampire in the story is a side note, barely focused on by the author. Once Sister Catherine notices him, and figures out he’s a vampire, she feeds him so he will get well and come back to finding God. Not a story I felt really belonged in a book about Vampires that did NOT come from the Religious Fiction section of the bookstore.

“Faith Like Wine” by Roxanne Longstreet. Another story with overpowering Christian themes, that seemed to throw in a Vampire character in an almost offhand way. Joanna is a Vampire who was created around the time when Jesus was walking around with the apostles. Once she met Him, she…. its not clear, but I think she regretted becoming a Vampire or something. The story flits back and forth between her meeting Christ, and hanging out with the apostles to her present day of hanging out with this revival preacher woman who also has a large following. Most of the story has an overpowering Christian tone. Its like Longstreet opened her bible to the parts about Jesus being betrayed by Judas, and cribbed it for her story. Again, NOT something I wanted to read in a collection of Vampire stories that did NOT come from the Religious Fiction section of the store. By now, I was getting irritated. I hate when any religion is forced upon me, especially when I think Im getting one thing, and instead, find myself getting preached at.

If you do end up reading this book, skip directly to these stories:

“The Devil’s Mark” by P. N. Elrod. A man, self described as “witch pricker” is trying to get a small town to have some witch trials. But, once the trial starts, things are not going at all the way he planned! Very good twist ending! One of the shorter stories in the book.

“A Matter Of Taste” by Nick Pollotta. A bunch of Scots have this Vampire holed up in a cave. They can’t get near him to kill him off, due to the bats, etc. The Vampire also can’t get out, as morning is coming. The Vampire escapes saying he will rest, and return to get them all. Whats the town to do? Something brilliant! Another wonderful, if very short, story!

“Walking Tour” by Jean Graham. A Vampire, who was busy in London in the 1880′s returns to London of the 1960s. He is amazed by the changes he sees. He is impressed with the fact that his former incarnation seems to be much remembered. He hears people talk about these “singing insects”. Whats the fuss about? That kind of insect does not sing? Enough clues to know exactly who the famous “insects” are. Clever story.

The other stories I have not mentioned either did not hold my interest when I read them, or, just seemed to meander on and on without a point in sight. I would suggest skipping all of them.

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