Review: Dead Until Dark

Title: Dead Until Dark
Author: Charlaine Harris
Nationality: American
Year: 2001
Publisher: Gollancz
Length: 300+ pages
Rating: 6/10
Summary: Lacks bite

The outline

The first in the highly successful True Blood series, Dead Until Dark charts the early adventures of telepathic waitress Sookie Stackhouse and the Deep South vampire Bill Compton.

Sample

Anyway, his lips were lovely, sharply sculpted, and he had arched dark brows. His nose swooped down right out of that arch, like a prince's in a Byzantine mosaic. When he finally looked up, I saw his eyes were even darker than his hair, and the whites were incredibly white.
'What can I get you?' I asked, happy almost beyond words.
He raised his eyebrows. 'Do you have the bottled synthetic blood?' he asked.
'No, I'm so sorry! Sam's got some on order. Should be in next week.'
'Then red wine, please,' he said, and his voice was cool and clear, like a stream over smooth stones. I laughed out loud. It was too perfect.

The verdict

Until reading Dead Until Dark I had missed out on the current vampire craze. But having enjoyed Interview With the Vampire in my teens I decided to give it a try and Dead Until Dark seemed like a good place to start. I was disappointed.

The flaws with the novel are numerous. The plot holes are plentiful, the pacing erratic and the mid section of the book is dominated by one bad sex scene after another. You can spot who the murderer is the moment he saunters onto the page and the vampire love interest Bill Compton is so bland that Sookie Stackhouse can happily take him home to meet her grandmother.

So why didn’t I score it even lower? There’s something curiously addictive about Dead Until Dark that keeps the reader turning the page. Charlaine Harris’s ideas are good, even if the execution is shaky and there are some genuinely funny and exciting moments.

The main problem with the novel is that it doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be. With its theme of vampires ‘coming out of the coffin’ in small town Louisiana it would have made a great satire, but it just takes itself too seriously. On the flip side, it could also have been a dark and sexy vampire classic, but it just isn’t edgy enough.

I won’t be rushing out to buy the next in the series, but I saw glimpses of why the books are so popular.