The danger of doing anything excessively is that it can dull the senses. For example, living in Europe, I've become somewhat immune to the beauty of cathedrals, due to the number I've visited. Their elegance doesn't diminish with each new trip- just my appreciation of it. Variety is the spice of life, so even the most stunning object can become mundane when frequently visited. Reading is no different- I've read a lot of books this year, and many good ones, but I've rarely been blown away, perhaps due to the frequency of my readings. My latest selection, however, knocked my socks off, and I never saw it coming.
Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter is a highly unusual work. Too fantastic to be historical fiction, yet too factual to be pure fiction, some have termed it "mashup" fiction. It's basically a biography of Abraham Lincoln- his birth in Kentucky, formative years in Indiana and Illinois, presidency in later life- but with a serious twist: he hunts vampires. Why? Because his mother, sister, and others dear to him were killed by them. Abe learns of vampires' existence by overhearing a conversation between his father and a vampire; he later learns that vampires exist in vast numbers all over the world, and that in America, there are essentially "good" and "bad" bloodsuckers. One of the former befriends Abe, and teaches him the tricks of the vampire hunting trade, and informs him periodically of the location of the more notorious bad vamps. Fueled by both passion over lost loved ones, and a desire for justice, Abe sets out to rid America of all of the monsters. His avenging quests are inter-weaved with his true life story, so you end up learning a lot about him as you enjoy the obviously fantastic tale.
This work is of surprising quality- the 330 pages flew by. It was vastly entertaining, and highly recommended. A movie by the same name has been released; I have yet to view it, but it's now high on my list.
Rating: A+
No comments:
Post a Comment