I recently bought and read obsessively:
The Strain: Book One of The Strain Trilogy
by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan



Del Toro is the Pan's Labyrinth guy, and if you haven't seen that movie you should stop what you're doing and rent it right now.



I liked the book and had trouble putting it down. I didn't love it. My all time favorite vampire book, by which I judge all others is:



I read it years and years ago, and it scared me. I remember getting up and closing the drapes in my home because I was so afraid of the dark outside the window.

I wasn't that scared reading The Strain, but I might be too old to be that scared again. I'm looking forward to the next Strain book, though.

Read it and tell me what you think!

PS- its nothing like this:



So lovers of that series, beware.

I didn't know Salem's Lot was about vampires.

Have you read any of the Sookie Stackhouse books yet?

I haven't, and I dont have HBO.

Are they vampire love stories? August is firming up to be a month of vacations... maybe I'll take them with me. Were they good?

Hmmm
I wouldn't describe them as "love stories" altho there are love scenes. They are well written and keep you hooked.

I find the HBO series very different in tone. Although some of the story line is the same (although with the second season they have gone right off the track) the tone is quite different from what I was imagining in my head. Still good tho.

What about Anne Rice? My friend says her first few (5?) books are his fav vampire books. I read the first one and it was MUCH better than the movie. I agree that Tom Cruise should never have got that role.

I forgot about that, Interview with a Vampire was a great book too. A really good read.

I just remember being young and living alone and not afraid of anything, yet having to shut out the dark, lock my doors, so scared by Salem's Lot.

I read Salem's Lot and I also saw the movie in my freshman high school English class. I woke up one night after that and thought I heard a knock at the window. I told myself it was just a branch but I looked out the window anyway. In the movie, the main vampire was a creature with a white, skull-looking head. That's what I saw at my window. I was so scared I fell out of bed and lay on the floor, unable to breath, much less scream.

I grew up on a farm. My dad's lawnmower had broken and rather then buy another one he got a goat and tied it up in the yard, moving it every day. That night, it was near the house and had reared up to my window to eat off the branch.

It sounds crazy and made up but it really happened and I was terrified.

That's Awesome! The cloven hoofed beast!

Your Dad replaced the lawnmower with a goat?! LOL!!!

I can totally see that happening though. I remember that one of my brother's friends put on a halloween mask and knocked on my window at about 2 in the morning. I was so scared...and then mad. I think I was about 10 yrs old.

I read quite a few of the Anne Rice books. The Vampire Lestat is totally most excellent. The rest go up and down in quality, although I think Blood and Gold is totally underrated.

I actually watched some of Twilight, and just could not get over the fact that vampires hundreds of years old would actually find teenagers all that interesting romantically and have that much in common with them. I'm only 38, and me and my 15 year old are on totally different planets...

Pans L reminds me of this - sort of




"There has to be an invisible sun."

I have to read 3 genre books for a class I'm taking this fall. I was thinking of doing vampires. I think I'll read App's suggestion, but I don't want to read Twilight or reread 'Salem's Lot. Does anyone have a suggestion for another vampire book? Or a mythocal-creature-as-allegory book? I want to go ahead and get the reading out of the way.

The Hobbit series?

The Clan of the Cavebear books are really good.

Are cavemen a genre?

I don't know, could be. When I think "genre" I think "not very good." Plot over charector, etc.

If you like Vampire books, I highly recommend "The Historian" by Elizabeth Kostova. It's LONG, I still haven't finished it and it's unusual for me to not get through a book in a week or two.

Appy, I am sure you would enjoy the Sookie Stackhouse books. If you are taking one for vacation reading, take two at a time because you will swallow them whole in about 3 hours each, I kid you not. I read the first one on my way back from DC and then had to sit there for a good hour and a half because I was out of book.

By the way, for that class, "The Historian" compares nicely with Bram Stoker's "Dracula". They reference that book a lot.

I started "The Historian" but didn't like it. It seemed a little too long and over the top. I may try a Sookie Stackhouse.

I love 'Salem's Lot.

Ever read "Jerusalem's Lot" in Night Shift? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem%27s_Lot
Good stuff.

I did read that! I was way into Stephen King in high school.

No one does vampire like Stephen King. Salem's Lot was awesome.

I read Jerusalem's Lot in Night Shift too Foxy. I love how King reuses characters and settings. It always makes me sad to finish a book and leave a character behind. With King, often you get to "see" them again.

Me too, and having a little bit of history to flesh out the whys of the book was great.

He reminds me a lot of Lovecraft in that way.

Only vampire book I've read. Pretty good, too.

I like Christopher Moore. I read Practical Demon Keeping and liked it. I'll look for that one.

I definately want the Christopher Moore.