Books: Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris

The supernatural romance novels that feature vampires -once only a sub-culture of the romance genre - has recently gotten huge boost recently, thanks to the success of the Twilight saga. One could argue that this genre has been around much longer, and written much better than the Stephanie Meyers series, but I digress.

Then add on the success of True Blood, the HBO series developed by Alan Ball, and based on these novels, has made Charlaine Harris’ Southern vampire tales just as popular.

What sets, maybe, these books different from the rest, is that Harris has kind of put a new bent on the tired vampire genre that made Anne Rice a household name. It’s vampire story alright, but it’s also part thriller, part detective story (both for the guys, maybe?), with a heavy dose of parody (which I like), and some romance (really for the girls).

Living Dead in Dallas, book two, begins with the death of Lafayette Reynolds, the openly gay cook of Merlotte's Bar, where Sookie Stackhouse works. Now while Bon Temps, Louisiana is a small rural town, there does seem to be a lot of deaths and while Reynolds was found in Sheriff Andy Bellefleur’s police car (Andy had gotten drunk the night before and left his car in the lot), and they did not get along, Sookie is sure Andy had nothing to with the man’s death.

But before she can begin to find out -by using her mind reading abilities - she and boyfriend Vampire Bill are on there way to Dallas as hired help to solve some crimes. It is there, that Sookie runs up against the local anti-vampire club, The Fellowship of the Sun. Trying to find a connection between the Dallas vampires and Fellowship brings Sookie into conflict that could kill her.

This is a much stronger book than first, if only because Harris does not have to set up the whole universe she’s created. Still, I’m unsure how to take her stance on gay people. Lafayette was gay and gets killed, there is a gay vampire named Farrell (who Sookie was looking for in Dallas), who was lead to the Fellowship by another gay vampire, the an ancient -and still looking like he was sixteen -Godfrey. The point is, I guess, Farrell was only into young guys -twinks they would be called in the gay sub-culture - and I find that Harris uses that stereotype to advance the story. I did not like that.

Almost all her characters in Bon Temps seem to dislike gays (which could be the stereotype also, but it comes across rather muddled if that’s her intent), including her bed-hopping brother. All of which seems disingenuous, as Harris went out of her way to make the Stackhouse clan more tolerant to people outside the norm.

But maybe I’m just being sensitive.

Overall, I enjoyed the book and will probably continue to read the series well into 2009. But I need a break, so I’ll take something else next.

Books: Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

What is our fascination with vampires? Since Dracula, the myths and legends of vampires has grown. Never a huge fan of vampire novels (though I adored Angel on TV, which was spun off from Buffy The Vampire Slayer), especially after the rise of Anne Rice, and more recently, the melodrama of Laurel Hamilton.

I’ve avoided reading books with them, if only because I found them boring and predictable. Maybe that’s while I like Christopher Moore’s take on vampires (Bloodsucking Fiend and You Suck, with a cameo in A Dirty Job) and the forthcoming Fool) and not the vampire love stories that are dime a dozen (and growing exponentially) in the romance section of Borders. Apparently, women find vampires attractive (and probably a subset of gay men).

Which, of course, explains the success of the Twilight book series and now movie.

But I digress.

Enter Sookie Stackhouse, the mid-twenties hero of mystery writer Charlaine Harris’ first vampire novel, Dead Until Dark. It’s a breezy, no nonsense take on the vampire lore with believable and well crafted characters. It is, by far, not going to win any awards for literature, but it’s a fun read and one can finish in a few hours.

The premise is murky, but apparently vampires have been living amongst us for generations, and now that a Japanese company has created a synthetic blood substitute, vampires have “come out” so to speak, and are now unliving around humans. One vampire has decided to move back to his small town in Louisiana, where he encounters Sookie, who saves him from a couple who drain vampires.

Now vampire Bill (yep, no poetically named vampires here) is a first mad at Sookie, but realizes that the waitress does possess a secret that intrigues him. But before their romance can start, Sookie becomes the target of a killer who is taking the lives of women who’ve had relationships with vampires.

Harris creates some wonderfully flawed characters here and that’s, perhaps, one of the better reasons to continue reading the series.

This book series, also, is being used as the premise for the HBO series True Blood.