Prince Lestat by Anne Rice
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A fun return to Anne Rice's familiar Savage Garden, which is entirely enjoyable as long as we're in Lestat's heightened, passionate voice. Unfortunately, we jump into the points-of-view of some of the other, older vampires, and these Children of the Millennia aren't nearly as interesting as Lestat.
The plot is cool: a Voice is cajoling some of the ancient revenant vampires to arise and burn the legions of fledglings abounding in the world's cities, and the older and more powerful vampires band together to see how they can counter these attacks. Except that the source of the Voice threatens all of them at their core.
As often happens with Rice's novels, the build-up is poky, with much frittering and reveling in lush but drowsy detail. And, as usual, I was fully engaged in the payoff, when suddenly the purple prose fits the tale. Everything is always luscious delirium with Rice, everything is adored or loathed, and that extrasensory indulgence feels tiresome unless the action matches the emotion.
I loved hanging out with brash, impulsive, ardent Lestat again, but still I long for a more subtle Louis book, or one of Rice's vividly realized historical outings. This was entirely contemporary, and while that had its own pleasures, the setting and actions weren't always up to the fervent language.
I would give Prince Lestat 3 1/2 stars if possible.
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