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szeglin's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
cassidyserhienko's review against another edition
2.0
The perfect book title does not exi-. Okay but seriously, perfect cover, perfect title, fabulous concept. Though, I was sold before I even read the description. Hendrix blends horror and mundanity to draw the reader completely into the story, which is an uncomfortable place to be. A book about a southern book club dealing with a slight vampire problem should have been a slam dunk for me, but there are glaring issues with how the novel handles racism and portrays (or doesn’t portray) its black characters that make it impossible to support this book.
I’ve seen lots of reviews saying that the novel is racist. I don’t know if the novel itself is racist, or if the issue is that Hendrix attempts to incorporate racism in the south into the narrative but fails to adequately explore what this means to the people who are affected. Which is why I don’t totally know how to feel about this. I get what it was trying to do, I just ultimately don’t think that it was handled well at all. It takes a lot of people to get a book published and I don’t understand how no one addressed these pretty obvious problems at any point in that process. You can’t write a novel about a vampire who targets black children and not have any black characters without it being intensely problematic (to say the least) no matter how good of a writer you are. The white saviour trope is so cut and dry here, it’s almost a satire. If James Harris had targeted the children of the old village itself the novel would not only have been more suspenseful because there was an actual danger to the main characters, but apart from an obvious lack of representation the Guide to Slaying Vampires would not feel so oblivious to the perpetuation of racial stereotypes and unnecessarily violence against people of colour that it is built on.
Slick sums it up pretty succinctly when she says “if anything bad was going to happen, it would have happened by now” - but something bad has already happened. Six Mile, the predominantly black neighbourhood, has been virtually obliterated and the children of the community have been the targets of James Harris’s appetites for three years. Even though Patricia sees this with her own eyes, she still agrees with Slick’s statement and thinks that the past three years has been forward progress for them. Even though Patricia has clearly not been okay for the past three she is still able to shut her eyes to what James Harris has been doing to the people of Six Mile as he ingratiates himself to her well-to-do white friends. Not only can Patricia ignore it, but the police and other town authority figures can ignore the signs that something bad is happening in Six Mile simply because the residents are black.
All of these issues could have been solved had Mrs. Greene or another character from Six Mile shared narrative duties with Patricia. From a structural standpoint, the fact that this community is the one where the actual story is taking place but there’s only one character from here makes it hard for the reader to see and feel the horror. I get that it’s supposed to be about this group of middle class housewives, but why is all of the action happening so far outside of their periphery.
A novel about a civil-war era southern vampire who targets black people? Okay, but then why isn’t it actually about black people? If you don’t actually address the fact that he’s targeting them because of the institutional racism that makes Six Mile a vulnerable community where police and other authorities are less likely to take an interest or ask questions, if black characters aren’t active in the story, then you’re just using gratuitous violence against black people for shock factor.
Hendrix could have done one of two things. Rather than attempting to utilize racism to construct a narrative for white women to save the day, the story should have been about and told from the perspective of women in Six Mile. Or, Hendrix should have focused his attention on the dynamics between the book club and their controlling condescending husbands and made the people of the Old Village James Harris’s main targets. If either of these had been the case, then I think that the book had the potential to be great. Ultimately though, it spread itself too thin and as a result committed the kind of ignorance that it was attempting to make a commentary on.
I’ve seen lots of reviews saying that the novel is racist. I don’t know if the novel itself is racist, or if the issue is that Hendrix attempts to incorporate racism in the south into the narrative but fails to adequately explore what this means to the people who are affected. Which is why I don’t totally know how to feel about this. I get what it was trying to do, I just ultimately don’t think that it was handled well at all. It takes a lot of people to get a book published and I don’t understand how no one addressed these pretty obvious problems at any point in that process. You can’t write a novel about a vampire who targets black children and not have any black characters without it being intensely problematic (to say the least) no matter how good of a writer you are. The white saviour trope is so cut and dry here, it’s almost a satire. If James Harris had targeted the children of the old village itself the novel would not only have been more suspenseful because there was an actual danger to the main characters, but apart from an obvious lack of representation the Guide to Slaying Vampires would not feel so oblivious to the perpetuation of racial stereotypes and unnecessarily violence against people of colour that it is built on.
Slick sums it up pretty succinctly when she says “if anything bad was going to happen, it would have happened by now” - but something bad has already happened. Six Mile, the predominantly black neighbourhood, has been virtually obliterated and the children of the community have been the targets of James Harris’s appetites for three years. Even though Patricia sees this with her own eyes, she still agrees with Slick’s statement and thinks that the past three years has been forward progress for them. Even though Patricia has clearly not been okay for the past three she is still able to shut her eyes to what James Harris has been doing to the people of Six Mile as he ingratiates himself to her well-to-do white friends. Not only can Patricia ignore it, but the police and other town authority figures can ignore the signs that something bad is happening in Six Mile simply because the residents are black.
All of these issues could have been solved had Mrs. Greene or another character from Six Mile shared narrative duties with Patricia. From a structural standpoint, the fact that this community is the one where the actual story is taking place but there’s only one character from here makes it hard for the reader to see and feel the horror. I get that it’s supposed to be about this group of middle class housewives, but why is all of the action happening so far outside of their periphery.
A novel about a civil-war era southern vampire who targets black people? Okay, but then why isn’t it actually about black people? If you don’t actually address the fact that he’s targeting them because of the institutional racism that makes Six Mile a vulnerable community where police and other authorities are less likely to take an interest or ask questions, if black characters aren’t active in the story, then you’re just using gratuitous violence against black people for shock factor.
Hendrix could have done one of two things. Rather than attempting to utilize racism to construct a narrative for white women to save the day, the story should have been about and told from the perspective of women in Six Mile. Or, Hendrix should have focused his attention on the dynamics between the book club and their controlling condescending husbands and made the people of the Old Village James Harris’s main targets. If either of these had been the case, then I think that the book had the potential to be great. Ultimately though, it spread itself too thin and as a result committed the kind of ignorance that it was attempting to make a commentary on.
j3rkin's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Whoa. What an experience this book was. In addition to the graphic descriptions expected with a horror/ vampire book, I found myself totally captured by the side character storylines. There is so much potential for group discussion, that makes it a great pick for book clubs. I just wish the pace was faster. It felt like so much build up before I actually took interest.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, and Domestic abuse
anredman's review against another edition
1.0
I adored the first two hundred pages. I loathed the closing two hundred pages. Incredibly frustrating and disappointing to have a humourous, engaging book turn into men being dicks and women being sexually assaulted.
* I'd initially rated this book a two, but the longer I noodled on it the more disappointed I was and the more distasteful the book became to me.
* I'd initially rated this book a two, but the longer I noodled on it the more disappointed I was and the more distasteful the book became to me.
maddiea247's review against another edition
2.0
i didn't necessarily struggle through this but it just wasn't good. the title made it seem like this would be a lot more exciting, but honestly a lot of it came off as gross. literally 90% of this book is no one believing there's a vampire in town. like they all just move past children going missing and getting killed, and the strange man with strange habits in town?
also this was supposed to be set in the 80s/90s? it gave more fifties with the god awful husbands, stereotypical housewives, racism, and sexism, but maybe it being set in the south was supposed to makeup for it? i don't know. and the way everything was resolved just fell flat to me.
also this was supposed to be set in the 80s/90s? it gave more fifties with the god awful husbands, stereotypical housewives, racism, and sexism, but maybe it being set in the south was supposed to makeup for it? i don't know. and the way everything was resolved just fell flat to me.
amandagibsonauthor's review against another edition
4.0
I feel like I’ve read it before but then I wasn’t sure so I read it again. Pretty good, normally can’t read books more then once though.
probably_confused's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75