3 Great Novels by Anne Rice

It's Anne Rice's 80th birthday and I would like to celebrate by going through my top three books by her. Here's a bit of a story...

When I was a teenager at school, I was pretty obsessed with the Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice. I used to draw comics about them in the back of my exercise books when the lessons were boring me to death. I went all the way through the series and then would go back and read them all again when the next one was coming out. I would pre-order the books so that they would arrive the day they came out and then, I'd spend all night reading them. They were the books that kept me sane throughout my teenage years and honestly, I wouldn't change that for the world.

So, I would like to show you my top three favourite books by Anne Rice. Of course, they may have other media such as a film or audiobook, but nothing quite beats the book now does it?

These books are going to be in no particular order

3 Great Novels by Anne Rice

Interview with the Vampire

Now, if you let me I could talk about this book for the entire day. But alas, we don’t have that much time. I think that you all already know what this book is about and when I first found it at the age of thirteen I was actually really surprised I had never come across it before. It seemed like my kind of book. By then, I was already embarking on a long-term relationship with Oscar Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray” (of which I have been a part of for just over fourteen years now) and this Vampire Chronicles stuff seemed like the best thing since sliced bread. Lestat and Louis reminded me, in more than one way, of Henry and Dorian. Henry corrupts Dorian keeping him forever beautiful, but cursed to a like he finds unfulfilling and moral questionable. This really does sound like Lestat and Louis to me. I think the one thing I really enjoyed about the book is that we see the whole thing through a frame narrative of Louis’ encounters with different vampiric customs and none of them are cliché and childish, but seem pretty logical. The book is written beautifully with some very memorable lines and passages that you will want to study off by heart because they are gorgeous.

I told you I would talk all day...didn't I?

The Vampire Lestat

The second one in the series is, as some people put it, a logical way to start the story again. In my opinion it is in the perfect place. We have Louis whom we are introduced to through Daniel. Then we have Lestat who is introduced to us through Louis. The next logical step would be to have Lestat who introduces us to people like Nicholas and Magnus and others. We learn about why Lestat always says ‘I’m going to give you the choice I never had…’, how he really became a vampire and thus gained the nickname “The Brat Prince”. Lestat is an often complex and conflicting character who, when left to his own devices, wrecks havoc across the human world by having zero remorse whatsoever. But all of these characteristics came from somewhere and we travel back in time a few steps in order to see what exactly happened to him to make him this way. One of my personal favourite books in the whole series, this novel answered so many questions for me and made Lestat one of my favourite characters in all of fiction.

The Vampire Armand

Armand in "Interview with the Vampire" is said to be 'the world's oldest living vampire' and I'm not going to mention any other vampires so it doesn't ruin it for you. But in "The Vampire Armand" we get the history of Armand - called Andrei when he is human - who grew up in the Kievan Rus in the 15th century. Obviously, there is the character Marius de Romanus who calls him "Amadeo". Marius is the one who educates Armand into a different way of life, taking him to brothels and such. But, as the book continues - there is something seriously going wrong in the relationship of Marius and Armand, pretty much what went wrong between Magnus and Lestat. But in reality, the relationship between Lestat and Louis never made it that far into anger. This book is filled with vampiric ideals and what it means to be a vampire. It is also filled with beautiful historical images and that is what makes it my third favourite.

Conclusion

I wish a massive happy birthday to Anne Rice and seriously, I'm running low here - I need another novel, anything at this point would do. Hell, I'd read about Lestat watching paint dry if I have to.