Interview with the Vampire (Vampire Chronicles, #1)

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Interview with the Vampire (The Vampire Chronicles #1)

by Anne Rice

3.83 · rating details · 108,538 ratings · 3,501 reviews

The time is now.

We are in a small room with the vampire, face to face, as he speaks, as he pours out the hypnotic, shocking, moving, and erotically charged confessions of his first two hundred years as one of the living dead. . .

He speaks quietly, plainly, even gently . . . carrying us back to the night when he departed human existence as heir--young, romantic, cultivated...moreThe time is now.

We are in a small room with the vampire, face to face, as he speaks, as he pours out the hypnotic, shocking, moving, and erotically charged confessions of his first two hundred years as one of the living dead. . .

He speaks quietly, plainly, even gently . . . carrying us back to the night when he departed human existence as heir--young, romantic, cultivated--to a great Louisiana plantation, and was inducted by the radiant and sinister Lestat into the other, the "endless," life . . . learning first to sustain himself on the blood of cocks and rats caught in the raffish streets of New Orleans, then on the blood of human beings . . . to the years when, moving away from his final human ties under the tutelage of the hated yet necessary Lestat, he gradually embraces the habits, hungers, feelings of vampirism: the detachment, the hardened will, the "superior" sensual pleasures.

He carries us back to the crucial moment in a dark New Orleans street when he finds the exquisite lost young child Claudia, wanting not to hurt but to comfort her, struggling against the last residue of human feeling within him . . .

We see how Claudia in turn is made a vampire--all her passion and intelligence trapped forever in the body of a small child--and how they arrive at their passionate and dangerous alliance, their French Quarter life of opulence: delicate Grecian statues, Chinese vases, crystal chandeliers, a butler, a maid, a stone nymph in the hidden garden court . . . night curving into night with their vampire senses heightened to the beauty of the world, thirsting for the beauty of death--a constant stream of vulnerable strangers awaiting them below . . .

We see them joined against the envious, dangerous Lestat, embarking on a perilous search across Europe for others like themselves, desperate to discover the world they belong to, the ways of survival, to know what they are and why, where they came from, what their future can be . . .

We follow them across Austria and Transylvania, encountering their kind in forms beyond their wildest imagining . . . to Paris, where footsteps behind them, in exact rhythm with their own, steer them to the doors of the Théâtre des Vampires--the beautiful, lewd, and febrile mime theatre whose posters of penny-dreadful vampires at once mask and reveal the horror within . . . to their meeting with the eerily magnetic Armand, who brings them, at last, into intimacy with a whole brilliant and decadent society of vampires, an intimacy that becomes sudden terror when they are compelled to confront what they have feared and fled . . .

In its unceasing flow of spellbinding storytelling, of danger and flight, of loyalty and treachery, Interview with the Vampire bears witness of a literary imagination of the first order.(less)

Paperback, 342 pages

Published August 31st 2004 by Ballantine Books (first published 1976)

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Community Reviews

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Jun 01, 2007

Gus rated it

I hate Anne Rice's writing so much that if it and I were in a romantic comedy together we'd be destined to fall in love and be married by the end of the movie.

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Aug 09, 2007

Mark rated it

One of the rare few books I couldn't finish. I could not empathize with the lead character at all - once he turned into a vampire I would be regularly bombarded with paragraphs describing how goddamn beautiful everything was now that he could see them with his vampire eyes. The forest was beautiful, the night sky was beautiful, the homeless people were beautiful...not normally, mind you, only when seen through vampire eyes.

These special vampire eyes might be the reason why Louis (n...more

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Sep 01, 2011

Kat Kennedy rated it

If you would kindly look at my shelves, you might notice that I've read a good chunk of vampire novels written in the past two decades. It seemed strange to me, though, that I still hadn't read one of the more important ones.

Now, I don't think it's because this book is particularly brilliant or a masterpiece. Yet it does represent an important paradigm shift in the representation of vampires in modern literature. Whilst Vampires are still unaccountably evil in this novel, they a...more

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Jul 20, 2011

Shovelmonkey1 rated it

Recommends it for: people who think that the history of Vampirism starts and ends with edward cullen

Recommended to Shovelmonkey1 by: 1001 books list

Shelves: 1001-books, murder-most-horrid, read-in-2010

Poor vampires. Such a bad press over the years what with all the blood sucking, neck snapping and general ravaging of virgins, maidens and anyone with a taste for Gothic-style bedroom furniture and an open window.

Still, now that Edward Cullen and his pan-faced fan base of moody teens have infiltrated popular culture, replacing the stereotypical images of pale, foppish young men in lacy cuffs and brocaded velvet jackets with a utilitarian Gap-Style wardrobe of urban wear (and a slightl...morePoor vampires. Such a bad press over the years what with all the blood sucking, neck snapping and general ravaging of virgins, maidens and anyone with a taste for Gothic-style bedroom furniture and an open window.

Still, now that Edward Cullen and his pan-faced fan base of moody teens have infiltrated popular culture, replacing the stereotypical images of pale, foppish young men in lacy cuffs and brocaded velvet jackets with a utilitarian Gap-Style wardrobe of urban wear (and a slightly sulky look), we seem to be moving further away from the more traditional imagery. That said, R-Patz (see I know the lingo, I listen to the kids) appears to be dead from the eyeballs down in many scenes and is probably as wooden as the stake which should be used to pin him back into his eternal resting place, so not all elements of the vampire legend have been entirely done away with.

Interview with the Vampire was effectively responsible for spawning the epidemic known as the great vampire obsession of the late 20th century or at the very least a huge resurgence in the interest in vampire myth and lore. Ok, ok Bram Stoker deserves a big old nod for originally bringing us the whole idea of wing-ed blood suckers who like nothing more than a snooze in a wooden box and a brisk sea journey to the north-east coast of England. Or if you like we can go a bit further back and point the sharp end of the stake at Sheridan Le Fanu for his sapphic vampires which featured in his collection of short stories "In a Glass Darkly". Whoever you'd like to blame for it, you have to admit they were onto a good wheeze. The romance of immortality fuelled by the go-juice of another human being (it goes down easier if you just think of it as a sort of clotted Slim-Fast meal) seems to have had a weirdly kinky appeal which has garnered it a fan base of millions. Lets break it down and see what there really is to like about being a vampire.

Eternal life - obviously gets a big tick but then it does depend who you get stuck with. If you end like Louis, locked in a bitter battle of wills with the sadistic Lestat, then eternity is going to seem like, well.... an eternity.

Drinking blood - readily available, free (therefore credit crunch chic), nutritious and virtually calorie free. It's simple: Live fast, die young, drink blood and have a good looking and upwardly mobile corpse. (WARNING: don't try this at home- this review is not suggesting that a diet of blood will ever do you any favours, nor is it condoning "borrowing" the blood of people who are not you). Alternatively, forever is a long time to go without a solid meal and you know you'll eventually start complaining that dinner always tastes the same.

Flight/ surprisingly speedy turns of movement - being super fast is a handy skill to have if you need to face the pacey modern lifestyle of the 21st century. Queue jumping, being first in the door at the Harvey Nichols January Sales and avoiding having to sit in economy class during flights are all things which would improve my life.

Sleeping in a coffin - compact and bijoux if you live in a tiny inner city apartment where you're kitchen, bathroom, living room and bedroom are all practically the same room. Why not drape your coffin with an attractive throw and turn it into a table for night-time use? On the downside no one ever said eternal rest would be a comfortable one.

Interview with the Vampire takes itself pretty seriously (a lot more seriously than this review), and despite the fact Louis' hand wringing and tortured immortal soul act did start to grate on me towards the end, overall I enjoyed this and was able to stop raising my eye brows long enough to appreciate the detail and originality of the story. Fangs for the great story Anne!(less)

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Oct 22, 2011

Becky rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: vampires, owned, horror, historical-fiction, fantasy, audiobook, disappointing, made-my-eyes-bleed, mystery-and-thrillers, religion-related, reviewed, 2011

Oy... Can a book be disappointing if I expected not to like it? Or, rather, can I be disappointed in it?

Yep.

This was seriously boring. And repetitive. And boringly repetitive. And unexciting and also it rehashed the same things over and over. And over. Did I mention it was boring? Because it was. Even more than I expected. At about 100 pages in, I was like "OK, this isn't terrible, that's good." And then... It just stayed right there. At "Not Terrible"...moreOy... Can a book be disappointing if I expected not to like it? Or, rather, can I be disappointed in it?

Yep.

This was seriously boring. And repetitive. And boringly repetitive. And unexciting and also it rehashed the same things over and over. And over. Did I mention it was boring? Because it was. Even more than I expected. At about 100 pages in, I was like "OK, this isn't terrible, that's good." And then... It just stayed right there. At "Not Terrible" level. Nothing interesting happened, nothing exciting, nothing to make me want to find out what happens. I finished this simply because I was knitting stuff and running errands, and I might as well listen to something while I did that, but mostly I just zoned out, especially towards the end. Impressive endorsement, eh?

So, OK, here's the book, Cliffs Notes version:
There is a vampire giving an interview to a mortal "boy", telling his life story. (By the way, aside from the novelty of finding out that there ARE actually vampires, I have no idea why this boy sat all night listening to this vampire. He seemed interested... but by what?) Anyway, so, this vampire tells his life (or undead) story: A vampire met him, coveted his property, turned him, moved in, manipulated him and was a general, all around jerkface. Our narrator vamp, Louis, whines a lot. Gets all existential-y a lot. Whines some more about existential stuff. Questions everything: Where do I come from? What is my purpose? Why do we need to kill to feed? Who made vampires? God? Satan? Bob the Builder? Are there more of us? Why is killing PEOPLE so much awesomer than killing animals? Why is killing some people (read: pretty ones) awesomer still than killing some other (read: not pretty ones) people? Why do I ask so many questions?

OK, I threw that last one in there. He should have asked it, though. I mean holy crap on a stick, he's got The Life™: he's rich, and smart about investing so will likely remain that way, handsome, and immortal, which all amounts to him being able to do whatever the hell he wants to for as long as he wants to. Yet all he does is WHINE and ponder the meaning of life... or undeath. Because, you know, humans have it all figured out. /snark.

Anyway, plot summary continued:
Lestat continues being a jerk, and adds a 3rd to their happy family, a child. Who will remain a child forever and ever and ever... except in her mind. (Oh the bitterness and anger and existentialism and questions... They never end!!) The two turnees don't like Lestat (because he's a jerkface, remember?) and so they plot their method of getting him out of the way and going on their merry way to find their own answers. They travel around and find zombie vampires, ask some more questions about them... travel more, and then they find more vampires! Wooo! Finally, something like progress! Only... these vampires are also boring fucking paper wastes. They are all existential-y too, only their subject of choice is technically death rather than existence. So, again, a rehash of What It All Means™... You get the point by now, right? I mean MY point, because I still don't think the book has one.

Frank Muller reading the audio helped me to get through this. Anne Rice has diarrhea of the pen when it comes to detail, and her pen only writes in one color: Purple.

Her purple pen has put me off of quite a few of her other books, and would have put me off this one too, had I not been able to find something shiny and zone out for a good 20 minutes at a time while she described a door, or moon reflection on the water, or the texture of the smell of velvet or some such. Shiny thing, you saved my sanity. Thank you.

Anyway... I don't know why I continue to attempt Anne Rice. I think it's because so many people love her books, and there are so many of them, that I rationalize that the next one will probably be better. Except... no. It's not. Or maybe it's just ME, and I just don't like her. Six of one, half a dozen of the other. I think this will be my last attempt though. At some point, one just has to admit defeat and move on.

I've finished two of Rice's books, ever, out of a combined 7 or 8 or so attempts, if I remember correctly, and I didn't like either of them. Fail.

Halloween October 2011: #9(less)

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Apr 30, 2011

Sherri rated it

Shelves: urban-fantasy

It was 1978 and I was visiting my aunt and cousins in the mountains of North Carolina. My older cousin, Karen, was away being a teenager (Bible camp, I think) and I slept in her room while she was gone. I had a new color-in blacklight poster, the black flocking untouched, and a precious Peter Frampton poster I'd bought with my allowance. My other cousin, Lynn, and I spent hours roaming the wilds around the trailer and giggling over Shaun Cassidy and her passion for KISS. Karen had this book s...moreIt was 1978 and I was visiting my aunt and cousins in the mountains of North Carolina. My older cousin, Karen, was away being a teenager (Bible camp, I think) and I slept in her room while she was gone. I had a new color-in blacklight poster, the black flocking untouched, and a precious Peter Frampton poster I'd bought with my allowance. My other cousin, Lynn, and I spent hours roaming the wilds around the trailer and giggling over Shaun Cassidy and her passion for KISS. Karen had this book sitting on the floor next to her bed. One rainy afternoon while Lynn was doing something else and I was bored, I picked it up and started reading.

I finished it some time early in the morning, slept through most of the day, and that afternoon, opened it up and read it again. Later that week, when she got back from camp and was brushing her teeth (30 minutes with baking soda) I negotiated a trade with Karen -- my Peter Frampton poster for the book. I had to have it. I almost had to throw in the blacklight poster, but Karen was a bigger Frampton fan than I was.

For a 13 year old in the late 70s, Interview was heady, heady stuff. I could barely remember Dark Shadows, had seen perhaps half of some cheesy Dracula movie, and tended to think of vampires in terms of Count Chocula and Grampa from The Munsters. Yarbro hadn't crossed my radar and possibly wasn't in my local library. This book? This was dark and passionate, sensual and sexual, intoxicating and mysterious, unbearably sad, deeply angry. Yeah, a lot for a 13 year old to drink in.

How exactly do I convey my memory of Rice's New Orleans velvet heat? How do I describe my mental vision of Louis (who looked nothing like Brad Pitt) and Lestat (who looked like anyone but Tom Cruise!)? I can't recount the speeding heartbeats that echoed in my ears as I read. I don't remember pages or words or text at all. I floated ghostly over the streets of Paris, witnessing depravity and cruelty and obsession, love and sacrifice, touching the satins, feeling the breath. The novel caressed my skin and whispered to me.

Nothing else I've read by Rice -- and I did try -- achieved the power of this outpouring of madness and grief. I've read the book several times since that particular summer of hair rock and Hardy Boys and, while I'm aware it has flaws (the angst! Oh, the angst!) none of them affect that smokey music and incense infused darkness the book still has. It opened the door to the now tired and wrung-out sexy-vamp trend, set the tone for a genre, took vampires out of their Victorian euphemism and innuendo, and produced them anew in the imagination, more violent, more real, and certainly more deeply wired into the psyche and body. While it harkens to those earlier versions in penny-dreadfuls and B movies, it doesn't lean on them or owe them much for its existence (certainly not the way much of the modern genre lean on it).

For me, it will be always locked into place in a certain summer on a narrow bed under the poster of a long haired guitarist.(less)

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Mar 03, 2011

Gaijinmama rated it

Shelves: paranormal, re-read, fiction, favorites

I am going to confess that I didn't read this book until 1993, after I'd seen the movie. I couldn't handle horror movies or scary books at the time, but Brad Pitt, Antonio Banderas and a surprisingly good Tom Cruise really got my attention.
Now I'm a bona fide fan. I'm working toward reading everything Rice has written, and now I enjoy many other authors who write about vampires.
It wasn't just that the vampire dudes were soooo totally hot in the movie. As is usually the case, the b...more

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Feb 10, 2008

Ren rated it

I first read this book in High School and my sad gothic self immediately fell in love with its beautiful, damaged characters. For years this book haunted me. The rest of the Vampires books were pulpy fun but this book really had something. She captured something here and her almost baroque prose really carries the story.

Later in life, I came to realize that Interview is a kind of Catcher In The Rye for goths. Louis is turned into a vampire and continues his search for the answers: w...more

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Jul 09, 2007

Jason Pettus rated it

Okay, I confess, I've actually read the first three of the novels in this fantastical series; but that they declined in quality so rapidly and profoundly that I just couldn't continue after that. Still, though, this first book of the series continues to be surprisingly strong, even if it single-handedly brought about an entire "goth industry" that threatens to turn all of Rice's original material into parodies of itself. A sprawling epic that is as much a vivid fictional history of the...more

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Sep 19, 2008

Joelle rated it

I thought it was slow, difficult to read. I finished it only by sheer determination, not out of pleasure.

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May 05, 2011

Rumi rated it

· review of another edition

Recommended to Rumi by: Vennie

Shelves: books-i-don-t-own

"Interview with the Vampire" is a truly remarkable book. Without claiming to be a fantasy know-it-all, I'd like to say that the characters in this book are probably some of the most well-developed fantasy creatures out there. Each one has their own doubts, fears, hopes, and a whole system of values. They might not always act as expected from them, but then again, do they have to be perfect, all-knowing, wise and so very distant from humans every single time? What Anne Rice has created ...more"Interview with the Vampire" is a truly remarkable book. Without claiming to be a fantasy know-it-all, I'd like to say that the characters in this book are probably some of the most well-developed fantasy creatures out there. Each one has their own doubts, fears, hopes, and a whole system of values. They might not always act as expected from them, but then again, do they have to be perfect, all-knowing, wise and so very distant from humans every single time? What Anne Rice has created is not only a work of fiction, but also a study of psychology.

I have never read a book which goes so deeply into vampire nature, telling us a whole new story of insecurity, where dark thoughts battle with the constant fascination by the world; where the need to be together with somebody of your own kind overcomes all obstacles, even your own hatred; where the struggle for knowledge fights for its existence with the fear that there might be nothing to know; where cold comfort meets change. And all this is so stylish, so dark and dangerous, that nobody dares to think these vampires are funny or stupid.

Isn't it paradoxical that the book's approach to fantastic creatures is so logical, yet so rarely used in modern-day fantasy literature? After all, some of them have been humans before their transformation, right? Why does no one pay attention to their struggle after becoming vampires for example? Where does the presumption that they suddenly become encyclopedias come from?! I'm not saying the human psychological approach towards them doesn't exist, such a thing I cannot claim, but it still is an uncommon concept. Perhaps it's harder to think before writing, to analyze the options and get to know your own characters, to predict their every move. All too often, modern-day authors just find in fantasy an easy way to escape all logic and write whatever comes out from under their fingers. That is why, I fear, literature teachers will always retain their negative attitude towards fantasy. Which is a shame.(less)

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Feb 17, 2009

Black Elephants rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: scifi-fantasy

I proudly spent the first part of my weekend with the undead, meaning that I watched episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a television show that is glorious, an example of genius and just neat-o. I enjoy my cheese. So, it seemed logical to delve further into the vampiric canon and finally buy Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire.

First, it must be understood that I have a history with this book. Aside from already seeing the movie (which I thought was fine) and reading Rice's Mayfair...moreI proudly spent the first part of my weekend with the undead, meaning that I watched episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a television show that is glorious, an example of genius and just neat-o. I enjoy my cheese. So, it seemed logical to delve further into the vampiric canon and finally buy Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire.

First, it must be understood that I have a history with this book. Aside from already seeing the movie (which I thought was fine) and reading Rice's Mayfair trilogy, I had been trying to buy Interview with a Vampire for the last few years. I was always on the lookout for it in an airport because it just seemed like the right kind of book to help make the hours on an airplane fly by. But as fate would have it, other Rice titles would grace the duty free shelves, but never the one I wanted.

So, I bought it! Finally! The wonderfulness of Wikipedia had also filled me in on the entirety of the Vampire Chronicles. I knew exactly what I was getting into: Lestat! Claudia! Evil! I opened the book. I started the book. I closed the book.

Day 2: I opened the book, read a few pages, closed it.

Day 3: Opened it and finally made it to page 21 when Louis is transformed, sheds his mortality, sees his last sunrise EVER! And I yawned, closed the book and dropped it to the floor.

It must say something about how dull I found this book when I hated every single character, especially the protagonist when all he had pretty much done was spiral into a depression due to his brother's death. Equally detrimental was the language, which I thought was trite and pretentious, hollow and without depth. It lacked life (ha ha).

I found this to be the same problem with Michael Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost. That was a book I tried to read three times over the course of a year, but every time I lost interest because of the glamourless words. (It was surprising because Ondaatje is a very well received poet).

Despite my disdain for the book however, I do know that Ms. Rice has legions of fans devoted to her vampires. Therefore, I would like to use this entry as a dedication to one of the most boring books I've ever read. Have a title yourself? A book that just wouldn't end fast enough? Felt like a Sisyphus, eternally surmounting a plot and finding that you never got anywhere? Comment here and share! Or write your own entry! But don't let your opinion disappear off into the night!

(less)

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Nov 17, 2008

Tracy rated it

Recommends it for: Anyone who tends to read a little slower

This book was a slow read, and I didn't find it very interesting. The narrative drifts in and out of metaphorical prose, making it difficult to understand what was really happening and what was artistic expression. The author became so caught up in the love of her own prose that she afflicted the reader with the mental haze of her storyteller. I tend to read at a faster pace, and many passages required re-reading to grasp what really was going on. If this was the only problem with the book, ...more

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Dec 01, 2008

Christina Stind rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 1001-books-2006-edition, 2008, fiction, 1001-books-2008-edition, 1001-books-2010-edition, 1294-books-all-3-lists

This is my first Anne Rice novel and her writing reminds me of Stephen King - they both drag you into their worlds and keep you there, making you race though it to the end as fast as possible to find out what happens.
Interview with the Vampire is the story of Louis mostly, how he became a vampire at the hands of Lestat, how they together made the child vampire Claudia, how Claudia and Louis parted ways with Lestat and went out into the world to search for other vampires and finally found ...moreThis is my first Anne Rice novel and her writing reminds me of Stephen King - they both drag you into their worlds and keep you there, making you race though it to the end as fast as possible to find out what happens.
Interview with the Vampire is the story of Louis mostly, how he became a vampire at the hands of Lestat, how they together made the child vampire Claudia, how Claudia and Louis parted ways with Lestat and went out into the world to search for other vampires and finally found what they were searching for and more in Paris, at the Théâtre des Vampires.
But it is also a story of being who you are and accepting your nature. This is especially evident because of the fact that Louis tells his life story to a boy and tells about the fight he has continued to fight over the centuries - the fight between good and evil. Louis sees the kill (of humans, at least) as evil - but at the same time some kind of kill is necessary to keep him alive. And even though Louis thinks the boy should be scared of him, he has no intention of killing him.
I liked Rice's take on the vampire legends. Having grown up on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I have most of my vampire knowledge from that tv show and Rice has another take on the vampire myth altogether. In her world, garlic and crosses are not capable of hurting a vampire - only fire, beheading and sunlight are deadly to them, otherwise they are immortal. This also makes the struggle between good and evil more interesting because normally, the fact that the cross (and holy water) hurts vampires is a easy way of showing that they are evil but without this part of the myth, their being evil is more of a question and therefore more interesting.
For me, the most interesting part was Claudia - Claudia can be seen as an example of what would have happened to Peter Pan if he had been allowed to never grow up. Imagine living century after century as a small child - at some points, dolls and toys are not enough to satisfy you, you want more, but how are you going to get it, being pint size and all?(less)

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Nov 04, 2010

Brooke rated it

Shelves: 2010-bookklubbers-selection

Interview with a Vampire was a completely different kind of book than anything I have ever read. I probably never would have picked it up, but it was the book of choice for bookclub this month. I was very surprised by how much I liked it because typically I don't read vampire books (with the exception of the Twilight saga, and come on, EVERYONE read those) and I would have thought this book would be too slow for my liking. But for some reason, I found myself really enjoying it.

The w...moreInterview with a Vampire was a completely different kind of book than anything I have ever read. I probably never would have picked it up, but it was the book of choice for bookclub this month. I was very surprised by how much I liked it because typically I don't read vampire books (with the exception of the Twilight saga, and come on, EVERYONE read those) and I would have thought this book would be too slow for my liking. But for some reason, I found myself really enjoying it.

The way it is written, as a conversation between the Vampire Louis and the boy, was something I have not seen before. It made the text of the book look strange to me, because most of the dialogue is already in a paragraph and so the book looks like a heavy read. I also usually get bored in book where there is a lot of explanation or if there is a lack of dialogue, but for some reason, I was enthralled with Anne Rice's descriptions. I felt like I got such a deeper understanding of the FEELING of the characters. It gave me a much better appreciation for the movement of the story, and the ups and downs. I really felt connected to not only their thoughts, but their emotions. Although sometimes the descriptions were over the top, I found myself surrendering to them, rather than becoming annoyed.

I was also surprised at the sensuality of the kill for Vampires. I had never thought of it in that way before. And the utter devotion of one Vampire to another, but not necessarily between the same two, made for a very interesting dynamic.

Claudia haunted me throughout the book. I don't know if the thought of a woman in that tiny body chilled me more or the strange relationship between she and Louis. I was never entirely sure if their relationship was a father/daughter or that of almost lovers. Either way, the juxtaposition of her womanly statements from that tiny body was eerie. Such a crazy concept for Anne Rice to come up with.

Overall, I think it was the connection to the emotions of the characters that drew me in the most. At the end of the book, I didn't feel like it was the end of the story, and clearly its not- this is the first of 10 books! Im sure I will read the next one. I am really glad this book was on our book club list, or I never would have been exposed to this very original read. It was perfect for the Halloween season! Now Im excited to watch the movie...

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Apr 30, 2008

Star rated it

I'd loved that you get a person talking to a vampire and there is no threat that it will go at you and that it's telling you it's life story or actually how it became what it is. the journey it had taken over the centuries and knowing who actually turned it to what it is now. plus wanting to know of it's origin and the oldest of the old of it's kind.

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Dec 05, 2008

Cecilia rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: vampire lovers

Shelves: anne-rice, vampires

Este fue el libro que hizo que, durante varios años de mi vida, anne rice fuera una de las escritoras que más leía. Y no tenía nada que ver con ser "gótico", si no que, simplemente sus personajes me parecían sumamente reales. La soledad, la miseria, el odio y el amor, son emociones humanas, no vampíricas, por lo tanto, no es difícil comprender por qué tantas personas se "enamoraron" de sus vampiros y siguieron toda la saga de novelas vampíricas que esta mujer creo. Otro de lo...more

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Dec 07, 2008

Kitiara rated it

Recommends it for: Cualquier lector interesado en vampiros

Recommended to Kitiara by: My sister

Shelves: vampiros, novela-gotica, historica, terror

Esta primera novela vampírica de Anne Rice, es un claro ejemplo de lo que la literatura gótica es. Hubo un antes y un después en los libros de vampiros, después de esta trilogia.

Si bien el resto de sus novelas de vampiros tienen una fluidez, una rítmica y un estilo totalmente diferentes, no se puede apreciar la trilogía sin llegar a amar y a odiar a este libro.

Es oscuro y angustioso. La acción sucede muy lentamente, y sin embargo cuando ocurre es casi violentamente rápida...more

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Jun 09, 2010

Michelle rated it

I first read The Vampire Chronicles in the 1980s when I was a teenager. I loved them even then, but I'm getting a lot more out of them now that I'm older.

Interview isn't my very favorite of the lot, but I have to give it 5-stars for introducing us to a dark, modern incarnation of the vampire and for setting up an incredibly complex world using just the seed of original vampire lore. While this one reads a bit more more commercial than the second book, The Vampire Lestat (putting up ...more

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Nov 28, 2008

Aik rated it

I went in expecting to hate this, seeing that it's meant to have caused the decline of vampire fiction and all. I didn't see this while reading it. Perhaps it's the fault of later books in the series.

The book has its problems. The 'interview' parts are jarring and unnecessary, and the story would have been better told without them. There's also an extreme 'lolwut?' moment where the main character starts acting from impossible to understand motives. Other than this, everything is good...more

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Oct 17, 2011

Erika rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: series-following, to-re-read, vampires-zombies-werewolves-etc, louisiana, usa, france, europe, north-america

I remember my mother telling me she liked the interview with the vampire movie a lot, and i think i saw it but it was a long time ago, so i don't really remember having seen it, only my mother telling me she liked the movie.

Later when i was wandering through the Goodreads pages i saw this book, and i was fairly excited with this book and the whole series, more for all the good opinions about it, that i thought it was a book i should totally read, and thought i would love it.

...more

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Feb 07, 2012

Peter rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: gothica

I have the audible audiobook version as it took me many years to get round to finally 'reading' this book, but I loved it. I think it has so many great characters and ideas and the prose is so atmospheric and alive, helped here by a good reading by Simon Vance.

The characters are paradoxically human in their dilemmas and concerns with death, immortality, morality, and the truth of life. I loved the way Louis describes things, especially his many description of heightened emotional or...more

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Feb 25, 2011

Kindle-aholic rated it

Shelves: fantasy

First read around 1994, here's what I remember: 4 stars; Brooding immortals who curse themselves and their inhumanity - only these don't sparkle.

My first taste of Anne Rice and I loved every brooding, moping moment of it. Lushly written, I devoured it.

Second read Feb 2011: 5 stars. This book, written in the 70s still stands up with all of the vampire novels of today. Rice's vampires are inhuman immortals, but with enough shades of their former humanity to keep them somewh...more

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Aug 10, 2011

teacup_carousel rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 1001-books

It seems inevitable that with the resurgent popularity of all things VAMPIRE that this book would start popping up again on everybody's "to read" list. But what's popular now in modern vampire mythos is completely anathema to everything this book is, and I can't help but feel a little sad on behalf of both the unwitting reader picking this book up to satisfy what they think is going to be a quick vampire fix, and for the text its self. A quick scroll through the reviews for this and yo...moreIt seems inevitable that with the resurgent popularity of all things VAMPIRE that this book would start popping up again on everybody's "to read" list. But what's popular now in modern vampire mythos is completely anathema to everything this book is, and I can't help but feel a little sad on behalf of both the unwitting reader picking this book up to satisfy what they think is going to be a quick vampire fix, and for the text its self. A quick scroll through the reviews for this and you'll see a lot of reviews starting off with BORING and WHAT A DRAG and I'M NOT STUPID BUT THIS WAS AWFUL. There's something to be said about paring off the right book with the right reader.

It's funny, other than Dracula, the great now and always and forever gothic classic of Victorian times, this is the only vampire book to make it onto that much coveted and discussed 1001 Books to Read Before You Die list. And despite this, I think that this book's major failing is that, despite it's content, because it uses the super natural as a vehicle for its tale, it has a heck of a time making it into the hands of the readers who would most appreciate this. Interview is not a quick, gory, slick or even a sexy read. Heck, for those of you who like vampire sex let me spell it out to you - the vampires in Anne Rice novels are physically incapable of performing the deed. Looses something right there doesn't it? Instead what this book really is, is a relatively modern look at atheism vs spirituality with more than a healthy meditation on the ability/inability of art to become a working substitute for human connections. If you suddenly woke up one day and found that you would never have to face god, or judgement, would you continue to live as a good person? Does doing something evil render you incapable of normal human emotion? What does it truly mean to live forever? These are the questions Rice grapples with in her debut novel to varying degrees of success, and if she doesn't always find the answer she is searching for, there's something to be said about at least making the journey itself.

So no, this isn't like other vampire novels out there. In fact I could say that this is the unvampire novel of the ages, the supernatural book for people burned out on tawdry vampire romances that have no conception of the true passage of time from one age into the next. If you're looking for something a bit more meaningful, if you don't mind that old fashioned Victorian style of writing where it takes three pages to say what could have been said in one line, if you can juggle the eerie feeling of encountering an antiquated set of morals against your own, then give this one a chance. (less)

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Jul 17, 2010

Knowledge Lost rated it

Shelves: 1001-books-to-read-before-you-die, gothic

It’s a book that I’ve been meaning to read for a very long time and finally did; the first book of the Vampire Chronicles, Interview with the Vampire. Surprisingly enough, Anne Rice has a certain beauty in her writing that reminds me of 19th century writing, which is a big bonus for me, as I do adore that style. The whole story is almost philosophical in the way it tells the struggle of Louis and his moral conscience, even though he has been turned into a Vampire. The battle of good and evil is ...more

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Jul 26, 2009

Cristal Marie rated it

· review of another edition

Louis's world is somber, lush, beautiful and heartbreaking. This wasn't the first book in The Vampire Chronicles I read, I picked up Merrick first and immediately was most intrigued by Lestat de Lioncourt, so I purchased Tale Of The Body Thief and then read The Vampire Lestat, Queen of The Damned and the rest of the series in order.

This book, the first in the saga, was ironically the last one I read. I guess I avoided it because Louis struggles so much with being a vampire, while Les...more

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Oct 22, 2008

Carrie rated it

Shelves: excellent

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jan 24, 2009

Brad rated it

Recommends it for: Ruzz and anyone who wants to feel the world more intensely

Recommended to Brad by: Pat Gulmick

Shelves: horror, vampire, faves

Twenty winters ago I read Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire for the first time. I read it again just before Neil Jordan's film version came out, and then I let it slip into the recesses of my personal mythology, only letting the memory of it pop out once in a while for some wistful nostalgia and a vow to read it again.

This year's glut of filmed Vampire adaptations -- HBO's True Blood, based on Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse books, and Stephanie Meyer's Twilight -- got me ...more

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Apr 26, 2008

Werner rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: (Not recommended)

Shelves: supernatural-fiction, vampires

To give credit where it's due, Rice's treatment of vampires in this book (and her succeeding ones) broke new ground in the sub-genre, in that she portrays them as actual characters, free moral agents whose personalities and values are continuous with those they had as living people, rather than ciphers wholly transformed into instinctive killing and feeding machines. (Of course, the TV series Dark Shadows, with the vampire character Barnabas, pioneered the same new ground earlier; but that was ...more

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Jan 26, 2008

Tom rated it

Recommended to Tom by: Eric Capron, a college roommate.

I wrote this review for an English course at BYU.

Questioning Humanity
Review by Tom Johnson

Anne Rice redefines the vampire lore in Interview with the Vampire, the first installment of The Vampire Chronicles. In her sensuous, poetic, and disturbing novel Rice explores the value of humanity by juxtaposing it with vampirism. This same blend of vivid imagery and psychological tinkering that attracted mature readers to The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned, ...moreI wrote this review for an English course at BYU.

Questioning Humanity
Review by Tom Johnson

Anne Rice redefines the vampire lore in Interview with the Vampire, the first installment of The Vampire Chronicles. In her sensuous, poetic, and disturbing novel Rice explores the value of humanity by juxtaposing it with vampirism. This same blend of vivid imagery and psychological tinkering that attracted mature readers to The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned, and that inspired a full-length motion picture starring Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Antonio Banderas forces the reader to question his own humanity. Delving into the nightmarish existence of the vampire, Louis (which spans from nineteenth century French Louisiana to the present), the reader is confronted with this question: If given the opportunity, would you forsake humanity for the seductive immortality of a vampire? By following the psyche of Louis, it is gleaned that this is not an easy question to answer because the boundary between humanity and monstrosity is hidden in a misty fog common to both states: depravity.
“I was a twenty-five year-old man when I became a vampire and the year was seventeen ninety-one (p. 5),” states Louis as he begins to tell his story to a young male interviewer recording every word on a modern tape recorder. Louis tells the account of his deep depression after the death of his beloved brother. He despises his unfair life and the race of humanity that makes it thus. He is without hope and desires death. Then, the vampire, Lestat, visits him. Lestat convincingly and “seductively” offers Louis his desire to die and at the same time live forever. Seduced by the proposition, Louis agrees to become a vampire. Lestat drains his blood and then offers the young plantation owner a drink of his own vampiric life force. Louis never witnesses another sunrise.
The main conflict is Louis’s struggle to maintain his humanity. At first he kills only rats, dogs, and other animals for sustenance, and when he finally gives into his instinct to take human life, he does it with reverence. This defies the nature of vampirism and Louis becomes a symbol of man’s struggle between feral and human nature.
Later, out of compassion, he “grants immortality” to a five year old girl, Claudia. Claudia is a symbol of innocence lost. She forever lives in a five-year-old tabernacle, but her killer instincts are vicious and her intellect keen. A bizarre romance unfolds between Claudia and Louis.
The adventures of Louis and his companions take him to Transylvania, Paris, and back to America as he tries to find meaning to his existence, all the while, grasping desperately at shreds of humanity.
Interview with the Vampire provides a new angle to vampire lore. Most vampire tales are from the perspective of horrified humans slaying obtuse monsters. Rice uses the setting of an interview to make the reader feel like a psychiatrist listening to his patient, the vampire, spill his feelings. Every act that Louis undertakes is filtered through human logic and emotion. Rice contrasts this by introducing vampires into the story that lack all human emotion and act solely on feral instinct. This makes Louis a round identifiable character. The reader has a relationship with Louis that does not exist with Dracula or other literary monsters.
Another strength of the novel is that Rice deftly weaves the supernatural with reality successfully inserting fantasy into the real world as opposed to having realistic elements inserted into a fantasy world. This gives the text a non-fiction feel that makes the existence of vampires seem credible.
A perceived weakness of the novel is that it contains content that is too disturbing for many readers. Rice uses great detail and imagery to describe vampiric homicides. Mature themes of sadism and sexuality (the undead don’t share the living’s sense of sexuality) are not suitable for all audiences. Like its cinematic offspring, the novel is rated R.
Another weakness is that parts of the novel feel like a psychological thriller full of horror and adventure, while other parts feel like an ordinary soap opera. The excitement, tension and horror are not constant.
Overall, Interview with the Vampire offers a worthy addition to vampire lore. A good horror story from the perspective of the “monster” puts the reader in an interesting position. Does the reader condemn Louis, or does he sympathize with him? The novel makes the reader understand what it really means to be human, to answer to reason, compassion and emotion instead of being a slave to predatory instinct. The novel is psychologically intriguing; however, it is not suitable for all audiences.
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About Anne Rice

Anne Rice is a best-selling American author of gothic, supernatural, historical, erotica, and later religious themed books. Best known for her Vampire Chronicles, her prevailing thematical focus is on love, death, immortality, existentialism, and the human condition. She was married to poet Stan Rice for 41 years until his death in 2002. Her books have sold nearly 100 million copies, making her on...more

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Books by Anne Rice

The Vampire Lestat (The Vampire Chronicles, #2)

The Witching Hour (Lives of the Mayfair Witches, #1)

The Tale of the Body Thief (The Vampire Chronicles, #4)

Memnoch the Devil (The Vampire Chronicles, #5)

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