Book Review: Prince Lestat by Anne Rice

Title: Prince Lestat

Author: Anne Rice

Series: The Vampire Chronicles #11

Genre: Paranormal Romance, Vampires

Publisher: Alfred A Knopf-

Pub Date: October 28, 2014

Pages: 458

My Copy: Hardcover

Book Summary:

The vampire world is in crisis – their kind have been proliferating out of control and, thanks to technologies undreamed of in previous centuries, they can communicate as never before. Roused from their earth-bound slumber, ancient ones are in thrall to the Voice: which commands that they burn fledgling vampires in cities from Paris to Mumbai, Hong Kong to Kyoto and San Francisco. Immolation, huge massacres, have commenced all over the world.

Who – or what – is the Voice? What does it desire, and why?

There is only one vampire, only one blood drinker, truly known to the entire world of the Undead. Will the dazzling hero-wanderer, the dangerous rebel-outlaw Lestat heed the call to unite the Children of Darkness as they face this new twilight?

Anne Rice’s epic, luxuriant, fiercely ambitious new novel brings together all the worlds and beings of the legendary Vampire Chronicles, from present-day New York and Ancient Egypt to fourth-century Carthage and Renaissance Venice; from Louis de Pointe du Lac; Armand the eternally young; Mekare and Maharet; to Pandora and Flavius; David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the Secret Talamasca; and Marius, the true child of the Millennia. It also introduces many other seductive supernatural creatures, and heralds significant new blood. 

Book Review:

This was an interesting book to read. Now I will preface this by saying I have loved the previous books in the Vampire Chronicles. This book was not as good as I had hoped it would be. It was a book that I felt was like visiting old friends and seeing where everybody is in the Vampire Chronicles at times.

Now I normally enjoy different point of views and a good story. I felt like having several or more than seven viewpoints in this book kind of made me feel like this was just at times to prepare us for something big and get to understand the other characters who are not Lestat. Lestat, is going through his own things. The point of views kind of made sense at least first, but it was like every chapter was a different character which kind of made me feel like this was a bunch of short snippets or stories strung together, It made me feel detached and not invested. Plus the introduction of some new characters were interesting, but I felt like they were introduced to give us some new insight into the world from their perspective.

The Voice character or presence was an interesting way. I liked the idea and concept of this being wanting Lestat and was willing to do anything to get his attention. The idea of this Voice being able to control young vampires make this threat very dangerous. We get some dangerous things happening when the voice takes over certain vampires bodies and they almost become like slaves to what the voice wants. Everything happens with some interesting developments. I really thought that Viktor being Lester’s son really was something that seemed a little far-fetched but it worked.

Rose’s story seemed to be very interesting, heartbreaking and very much one that makes you think that there is a real human story of pain and suffering and finding that there is always some hope and light that you don’t see until it comes to you in the form of someone you don’t expect. I though that the addition of having a doctor as a vampire was a really interesting way to examine the science of vampirism. 

Plus when Lestat and the voice finally do have their long-awaited confrontation, we learn who the voice is and what the voice wants/needs. He is someone who had a lot of pain, suffering and was there for some of the most important things in human history. I thought that this was interesting. Lester comes up with a solution or comprise for the voice and that they bond together. This was kind of an easy solution in my opinion. Usually Lestat fights harder and does things that are selfish. I thought that this was an interesting development for him.

Overall an okay book for me. I felt it lacked something, maybe it was the passionate, rebellious Lestat that I missed. There was too many point of views for me that made this book feel like it was a little bit of a book that dragged. Too many characters made me feel like there weren’t higher stakes. I’m hoping that the next book with Lestat in it will be better and that it will have higher stakes.

Rating:

3.5 Hearts