July ScaredyKIT: The Living Dead

July ScaredyKIT: The Living Dead


"Vampires" by steveczajka is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/2.0/?ref=openverse

In July, feel free to read any of zombies, vampires, frankensteins, or any other “living dead” you can think of.

Vampires: “A vampire is a creature from folklore that subsists by feeding on the vital essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deaths in the neighbourhoods they inhabited while they were alive. They wore shrouds and were often described as bloated and of ruddy or dark countenance, markedly different from today's gaunt, pale vampire which dates from the early 19th century.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire

Zombies: “A zombie (Haitian French: zombi, Haitian Creole: zonbi) is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie

Frankensteins: “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. Frankenstein tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankenstein

Some Suggestions:
(I will admit to reading many more vampire books than the others, so the bulk of my suggestions are leaning that way.)

Guilty Pleasures / Laurell K. Hamilton
I Am Legend / Richard Matheson
‘Salem’s Lot / Stephen King
Let the Right One In / John Lindqvist
Dracula / Bram Stoker
Frankenstein / Mary Shelley
Interview With the Vampire / Anne Rice

Don’t forget to post to the wiki: https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/2022_ScaredyKIT#July:_The_Living_Dead


"Frankenstein" by twm1340 is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/?ref=openverse.

I love a good excuse to read a zombie story! I am thinking of reading The Rains by Gregg Hurwitz for this theme.

I have both a vampire and a zombie book on my shelves so I will try to get to them both:

The Lesser Dead by Christopher Buehlman
This Dark Earth by John Hornor Jacobs

>3 sturlington:, The Lesser Dead is my favorite recent vampire novel, so I hope you enjoy it :) I just adore Buehlman's writing!

As for me...I think I'm going with Patient Zero (zombies!), which I've been meaning to read for ages...

Since I have read so few zombie books, I might go for one of these:
- Pride & Prejudice and Zombies / Seth Grahame-Smith
- Garbage Man / Joseph D'Lacey

Or, vampires:
- Nice Girls Don't Date Dead Men / Molly Harper
- Royal Blood / Rhys Bowen
- Iced / Karen Marie Moning

I'm going to read Frankenstorm off my shelf. Two people have tagged it "zombies."

I finished my choice for this month before the month even started, which never happens.
Fat Vampire 2: Tastes Like Chicken by Johnny B. Truant is the second in the funny Fat Vampire series. The main character is Reginald, a 350 lb. guy with low self-esteem who was turned into a vampire by a work friend who looks like a Goth but is revealed to be hundreds of years old.
These books were supposedly turned into a Syfy network series called Reginald the Vampire, but I've never come across it.

I chose The Last American Vampire by Seth Grahame-Smith for this month's read.

I finished The Lesser Dead by Christopher Buehlman and would recommend it as a different take on the vampire tale.

I have completed The Rains by Gregg Hurwitz.

I completed Salem's Lot by Stephen King and it fit the ticket pretty well. It is basically a retelling of Dracula set in a fictional New England town. I think a vampire needs to be a bit like a virus, it should not destroy its food source completely.

Not sure this really fit; I read it because it came up in a tagmash and I couldn't recall from earlier books in the series if it actually would. But, I'm not sure I'll have time to fit something else in...

Iced / Karen Marie Moning
3 stars

This is a continuation of the author’s “Fever” series, but told from the point of view of 14-year old Dani. This is a Dublin filled with Fae. Dani thinks of herself as a superhero with superspeed, superhearing, and super other things. She and a friend(?) are kind of “kidnapped” by a supernatural being (what kind… not sure, but must have been some kind of fae), Ryodan, and forced to sign a contract to work for him as he and Dani tried to figure out what was randomly icing over various locations and all the people in those locations, ultimately killing the humans.

It’s been too many years since I read the Fever series, and I didn’t find that the author did much in the way of recap, or what she did do wasn’t enough to really help me remember much of what was going on or who was who. The new storyline in this one – the mystery of what was causing locations and people to be “iced” – I found interesting. I thought I liked Dani as a secondary character (from what I recall) in the other books, but I didn’t like her much in this one. And all those horny men after a 14-year old!? Ugh! I am still rating it ok for trying to figure out what was causing the ice and the monsters they fought in the story.

Finished Patient Zero by Jonathan Maberry. Full review/rant written, but it's been a LONG time since I've been so underwhelmed by a recent-ish best-seller.

>14 whitewavedarling: read your review, looks like you are not alone in regards to the book lacking.

>15 Kristelh:, Honestly, I'd heard it was underwhelming...but I somehow thought that was coming from folks expecting more than an easy thrill-ride/escape. I didn't expect to have low standards for it and still be underwhelmed!

>16 whitewavedarling: I enjoyed it— but I listened to the audio narrated by Ray Porter and I honestly think it made all the difference in the world. I’ve read a couple things by Jonathan Mayberry since and have been both disappointed at the writing and amazed that Porter was able to make “something out of nothing!”

August thread is up; https://www.librarything.com/topic/342996#n7888228

I read Shadow Kiss, the third Vampire Academy book.

Royal Blood / Rhys Bowen
4 stars

(4th in a series) As Georgie’s brother and his wife come to London and are appalled at how Georgie lives, Georgie is asked by the queen to represent the royal family at a royal wedding in Romania. But Georgie is expected to bring her (nonexistent!) maid. At the last minute, Georgie finds someone willing to come, despite the perceived dangers of travelling abroad. Unfortunately, Queenie is a disaster as a maid! Even worse, when they arrive at the isolated castle where the wedding will take place – none other than Vlad the Impaler’s castle! – they are snowed in. Georgie is certain she is seeing vampires around the castle. Then at supper one night, a guest – hated by most of the others – suddenly dies, an apparent poisoning.

There is to be a lot going on in this one, but I loved the setting at the castle in Transylvania and the slightly gothic atmosphere of it. I really enjoyed some of the secondary characters (and I do like Georgie, too), but what a hopeless case Queenie is! In addition to the gothic atmosphere, there was humour scattered throughout the book. I was thinking I might like this best of the series so far, but it looks like I also rated the 2nd book the 4 stars.

>7 mstrust: Thanks so much for the mention of this series - I had not heard of it, but I ended up reading the first two books, and it was exactly what I was in the mood for. So funny - I have just started the third one. I was curious about the Syfy series - looks like it will premier this October 5th of this year.

Happy to point it out!
Thanks for finding out when the series starts, I thought I had missed it.

I finished a zombie novel: This Dark Earth by John Hornor Jacobs. Pretty good for what it is, but I feel like I've read enough zombie novels by now.