So I finished Bloodsucking Fiends: A Love Story, which was grotesquely overrated, unfunny and generally stupid. It’s about a pretentious loser of a wannabe writer, Tommy, and his vampire girlfriend Jody.
I cannot emphasize enough how dull and jejune this book is. All the characters are unironic, lazy stereotypes, from the gormless callow youth who somehow snags a sexy lady [Tommy], to the funny stoner coworkers, to the Wise Fool homeless man who helps to defeat the evil vampire [the Emperor], to the overbearing mother [Jody’s mom]. I get the feeling that Moore wants to coast on his supposedly witty writing, but he tries too hard to be funny, so both characters and joke come across as stale and desperate, rather than fresh.
Furthermore, Moore can’t write a convincing female character worth shit. Jody, who has the most interesting character arc as she learns how to be a vampire, has about as much personality as a paper bag. She doesn’t have an original thought in her head. For example, her first realization after she turns into a vampire is “I need a man.” I can think of many possible reactions — “I need medical care/answers/my friends/my family/my significant other/a drink/a shotgun/revenge/a nap/a moment to think/a cup of O positive/a way to calm down” — that would be believable responses to being vamped. “I need a man” is not one of them. “I need help and some sort of unquestioning stability; therefore I will exploit a lovestruck patsy” is conceivable, and it’s pretty clear that this is Jody’s plan, but “I need a man” is just a stupid false note. The only way “I need a man” would make sense is if women were dependent, weak, flaccid creatures without turgor pressure who needed men to provide life support and exoskeletons for them. Since they aren’t, Moore just reveals his limited understanding of what women think about. Boooooooring.
Up next: Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris because I like both vampires and mysteries.
2 Comments
Wow, harsh. I’m actually a rather big Christopher Moore fan myself (probably my third favorite author after Douglas Adams and Neil Gaiman) and at the time I read this I ripped through it in a day (a first for me at the time) and loved it. Now I’ll grant that I was in 8th grade at the time and haven’t gone back to re-read it since and am open to the fact that it may not hold up as well if I were to do so.
Just wanted to say how much I appreciate your cogent literary critiques. (That’s actually how I found you initially, through your Labyrinth/Jareth essays.) Anyway, I had had this book on my to-read list, but I’ll be bumping it down the list, given your review.