Fat Vampire

Nov 19, 2011 The Holy Terror rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: vampires, borrowed, male-protagonist, young-adult, paranormal, 2010

This was one of those books that started out funny and full of potential, but somewhere along the way the author strayed off that path. I wanted to read this for myself since the reviews were all over the place, but I'm sorry to say that this just wasn't great. As others have said, at the halfway point this book really starts to go downhill; the characters and story lose their charm, and what once was funny becomes sad and disappointing.

Doug Lee is a recently made 15-year-old vampire, who also h...more This was one of those books that started out funny and full of potential, but somewhere along the way the author strayed off that path. I wanted to read this for myself since the reviews were all over the place, but I'm sorry to say that this just wasn't great. As others have said, at the halfway point this book really starts to go downhill; the characters and story lose their charm, and what once was funny becomes sad and disappointing.

Doug Lee is a recently made 15-year-old vampire, who also happens to be fat and a complete dork. He's struggling with the transition and finds himself relying on his best friend and animal blood to get him through the day. He still goes to school and tries to appear normal; complaining of a skin condition and constantly wearing a poncho to combat the harmful rays of the sun. Through mysterious circumstances, Doug is placed with a vampire mentor, an even more mysterious man who lives by himself in a house full of books. It is this mentor, and Doug's feast of deer's blood, that help him become a "better" vampire.

At about the halfway point, Doug's story all but disappears, and it's the other characters that take the stage. Doug becomes a minor character is his own story. The whole idea was that Doug was becoming the vampire he wanted to be, and so therefor was more cool, menacing, and primal. But we don't really get to witness any of this. In fact, a whole year has gone by in the space of this novel, and I for one couldn't even tell. With the lack of detail and narrative, I was led to believe that the story takes place over the course of a month, at the most.

One of the characters the novel focuses on for a good party of the story is Sejal, a foreign exchange student from India. I frankly would have been happy if she had been the focus throughout. She was interesting, funny, and different - although I wonder if the author included her to spice up an otherwise lackluster story. Every other character was a one-dimensional, walking stereotype, and I didn't care about a single one of them.

It's sad really, because the first half of the novel was pure gold. It was funny and relateable and if the author had continued in that vein I'm sure I would have loved it. He had two many trains of thought going, and none of them really made it into the station. Part of the novel was written like a movie script and I actually thought this could add something, but in the end it just fell flat like everything else.

Without divulging too much of the ending, I want to say that I understood where the author was going with the story. Two characters remark early on about Neil Gaiman's Sandman and what the actions of that character meant at the end of that series. I'm sorry, Adam Rex, you're not Neil Gaiman.

The ending was the worst. Doug's character does a complete 180 again, and we're led to believe he's the sweet kid from the beginning again. I'm sorry, I'm not buying it. And you shouldn't buy this book either.(less)

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Aug 06, 2011 Homefrontgirl rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Do you ever feel like you're not the hero of your own life story? A subplot? The storyteller has pushed you into the background? Doug's story is just that. As the title character, the fat vampire, Doug starts the story, but by changing too drastically he pushes himself into the background and another hero emerges.

Doug is a typical teen with typical problems. He's unpopular, bullied by the jocks, just fringe-friends with the drama kids and a little overweight. He does have one great friend, Jay,...more Do you ever feel like you're not the hero of your own life story? A subplot? The storyteller has pushed you into the background? Doug's story is just that. As the title character, the fat vampire, Doug starts the story, but by changing too drastically he pushes himself into the background and another hero emerges.

Doug is a typical teen with typical problems. He's unpopular, bullied by the jocks, just fringe-friends with the drama kids and a little overweight. He does have one great friend, Jay, but it's clear their friendship is on Doug's terms and not Jay's.

Then Doug gets vamped and it's too late to lose those few extra pounds.

Doug is all he was before but with a new fear of sunlight and a thirst that won't go away. Jay is the only one he tells and they both head off to school in the fall.

Turns out Doug's not the only student with problems. In fact, most of the characters struggle with their perceived imperfections. Sejal, a foreign exchange student, has decided she needs a change. She has "the Google" which is an internet addiction. She's realized she is withdrawing from human contact and knows it's time do do something drastic. It is this very decision that shows she's the wisest character in the story.

Together Doug and Sejal have reasons to avoid people, their fellow students and each other. It's when Doug realizes he likes Sejal, and not just for her blood, that the hero of the story changes. Sejal has been watching Doug and she doesn't like how he treats his friend Jay. She rebuffs Doug and he decides to use this rejection as an excuse to show his true colors: he's an unlikeable jerk.

So the question is can becoming the undead actually make you more human? In Doug's case the answer is no. He could have used his change to vampire to become the unquestioned hero of this story. As an outsider before he became vamped, it's possible he might have adjusted better to this new class of different. Instead it just brought out what was always right under the surface. I found myself not caring about Doug after Sejal dumped him. Like the jerks I know in real life, I found myself wanting to turn away from Doug's storyline and focus on Sejal's. She becomes the character to watch. She's the one who makes friends and focuses on relationships. She's the one who knows that you don't have to have perfect human qualities to care about humanity. I wanted her to succeed and got bored with Doug. He had his chance to be the hero. To be empathetic not pathetic. Poor Doug.

It's after this change in the characters the story really goes downhill for me. The hero switcharoo didn't seem to work. A story from Sejal's point of view might have been stronger. The fat vampire taking a secondary role to the foreign exchange student half-way through just didn't move me. (less)

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Jan 14, 2012 Donna rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: best-bitten, squeemers

Absolutely fantastic. There is just no other way to say it. FAT VAMPIRE spoofs the hell out of everything that is vampire nowadays but maintains this underlying tone of seriousness that really hits home. Underneath it all it's about a kid fitting in in life. How many kids now are all vampire obsessed and want to turn into a vampire? Well Adam Rex takes that notion and slaps reality home like a puck into a net. If you're a meatball-looking geek in life, then guess what? You're going to be a meatb...more Absolutely fantastic. There is just no other way to say it. FAT VAMPIRE spoofs the hell out of everything that is vampire nowadays but maintains this underlying tone of seriousness that really hits home. Underneath it all it's about a kid fitting in in life. How many kids now are all vampire obsessed and want to turn into a vampire? Well Adam Rex takes that notion and slaps reality home like a puck into a net. If you're a meatball-looking geek in life, then guess what? You're going to be a meatball-looking geek in undeath. Except your lack of eating won't get you to lose any weight. Sorry.

It throws everything that pop culture has made of vampires right back in its face. Yeah, it sucks to have to go to school when you're a vampire because of that slight light sensitivity you have. The remedy? A poncho. Constantly. As if you weren't made fun of enough. And even as a vampire you can't get chicks to get with you because you're a bit of a creep factor. You take the je ne sais quoi that vampires are supposed to have and give it a holy water bath because that vampire blood didn't eradicate your inner comic book-loving goof.

The best part? The homage to The Lost Boys. Oh yeah, it's in there. And it's not very subtle if you're a fan of the movie. But it's awesome all the same.

There wasn't a character in FAT VAMPIRE that I didn't like. I thought Doug was an insanely complex character that even from the beginning wasn't your standard geek because he's never not a vampire in the book. So while he wants to geek out at Comic-Con, he needs to raid the local blood mobile in order to do it. And you can see him change; slip into his vampire skin a little better. And people notice it too, but it's not necessarily in a good way. And he has a hard time with this and it shows. Doug's just such a dynamic character; I really couldn't get enough of him.

Sejal was pretty cool too. There was really no bowing to American pressures at all and she really stood her ground when it came to Doug. She told him how it was without any pretenses and didn't back down. She's super girl for doing that, I think. But in the end she was there for him exactly how he needed her to be, which is different from how he wanted her to be. Read it and you'll see what I'm talking about.

The ending? Amazing. At first it starts off kind of quirky and goofy and then it just slams you with seriousness that leaves you going awww in a sad sort of way. It doesn't cut any corners, it doesn't sugar-coat anything. It ends exactly how the story should end and I love it all the more for it.

Again, absolutely fantastic. It's a satire without really being a satire but maintains it's seriousness about itself without taking itself too serious. It's funny (Doug is called Assferatu, win), it's witty and it puts vampires right back in the grave where they belong. Read it. You'll love it.(less)

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Dec 01, 2010 Savannah (Books With Bite) rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book was interesting and hilarious. I love how it was written, from a male point of view, which you don't see much. Also it was written by a male author.

I knew from the moment I layed eyes on this book that I would enjoy it immensely and that I did. Right from the beginning, you were thrown into this geeky, fat boys world of trying to make it as a fat vampire. I felt for him during his hardships. He struggle in feeding, as well in other areas.

I was glad to see he go help through a mentor....more

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Jul 12, 2010 Jennifer rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: paranormal-vampires

It was refreshing to read about a vampire that wasn't physically perfect. All too often, the people who are turned into vampires already possess unearthly beauty. The only outside flaws they exhibit result from some horrific torture years after becoming vampires. In Fat Vampire, Doug is an outcast, overweight teen. When he is turned, nothing changes. He faces being unattractive forever. Seeing a vampire character deal with this type of reality was definitely intriguing.

Unfortunately, Doug has a...more

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Jan 13, 2011 Kimberly rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2010, young-adult, fantasy-sf, arc

What a mess. The first half to two-thirds was really promising, but it disintegrated almost completely. My main problem was that the main character, Doug, starts off as a fairly likable but imperfect nerdy guy and transforms into the most unlikable protagonist I've ever read. And there's no real transition for it either - in one chapter he's amusingly trying to deal with being a "fat vampire" (lots of humor, great one-liners, joking around with his best friend, some moderate angst) and in the ne...more

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Mar 06, 2010 Kelsey rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The BEST vampire book in the history of EVERYTHING.
Up until this morning when I finished this book, Peeps by Scott Westerfeld was the best vampire book in the history of everything. And i thought it would remain that way.
But the mighty, mighty hand of Adam Rex has bitch-slapped Peeps out of the way and stolen that title for Fat Vampire.
It sheds a whole new light on "The Ennobled" -as the Signora Cassopeia calls them- and surpasses the luminous blacklight that Parasite Positives (or "Peeps") had...more

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May 07, 2013 Kiera Healy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Fat Vampire is not as terrible as some of the books I've read lately, but it's not great either. It's a weirdly disjointed book. There are massive time gaps between some chapters - we go from the titular character being an awkward mess to being a smooth operator with a girlfriend he's drinking blood from in literally one scene break.

It tries very hard to be funny, but it's really not. Maybe it's just not my style of humour, but the book is filled with set-pieces that don't work. It doesn't help...more

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Apr 10, 2013 Kareninsacramento rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: ya-fiction

I wanted to love this book, because I like Rex's work so much, but it didn't live up to its promise.

There is plenty of Rex's wonderful humor and bizarre setups, but the book manages to be both sensitive to East Indian culture and yet also generally homophobic (at least toward gay males). Teenage boy characters aside, the homophobia comes back several times and is fairly jarring.

The setup-- an overweight, pre-pubescent 13-year-old turned vampire and forever caught in that body and developmental s...more

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Apr 09, 2013 Elizabeth added it · review of another edition

Worst book I have ever read, and that's saying a lot. I felt that at the beginning the story line and sheer idea of the book had a lot of promise and was pretty funny. A chunky teenage kid who accidentally becomes a vampire and is stuck in his pimply teenage ways forever? I thought that was pretty clever. I was intrigued. However, as I began reading and continued to read I lost all interest in the book. The writing is choopy, there are holes and a lack of explanation in several parts of the stor...more

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Dec 17, 2012 Ben rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Fat Vampire starts out as a promising and witty look at the vampire genre from the viewpoint of a Chinese teenager. Specifically speaking a short, fat, pudgy, and generally not-so-good-looking Chinese male teenager. I enjoyed the narrator's insight into the problems of such a vampire, and the book starts out promisingly enough, but loses a lot of steam somewhere in the middle of the story. The plotline also focuses on an Indian foreign exchange student with a very interesting background story,...more

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Aug 18, 2012 Rachel Brown rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult, fantasy

A fat geeky teenage boy, Doug, becomes the world's least glamorous vampire in Rex's second novel. This one is nowhere near as assured or successful as Smekday.

It alternates narratives between Doug and Senjal, an Indian exchange student with an internet addiction. Doug's narration is dead-on as a geeky teenage boy. Senjal is potentially interesting but comes across more as a narrative construct than a flesh-and-blood character. But I was enjoying it, mostly for Doug's narration, until, at the two...more

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Jun 20, 2012 Gail Gauthier rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

"Fat Vampire by Adam Rex is not a perfect book. But, then, I don't read a lot of those.

Fat Vampire is an ambitious book. It starts out as a novel version of one of those unpopular/outsider teen boy movies, complete with a trip to Comic-Con. Doug, our main character, is a recently turned vampire trying to stay under the radar. Becoming a vampire was a major surprise for old Doug, and when our story starts, he's really just trying to function. That's all a lot of fun because Doug is no Edward What...more

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Jun 18, 2012 Dawn Vanniman rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This story started out completely funny and I was interested to see how an overweight, dorky vampire was going to work out. I mean, c'mon, Doug (the fat vampire) is attending ComicCon - have we heard of a vampire that would be caught dead doing that? (pun intended) Unfortunately, at about the halfway point, it all fell apart.

A rundown of the characters:

Doug - the fat vampire, he was attacked at his parents summer cabin

Jay - Doug's bff

Cat - girl Jay likes

Sejal - foreign exchange student from Indi...more

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Mar 06, 2012 Anna rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: horror, ya

One of the best things about the book is its handling of Sejal. She's sent from India to stay with an American family and is treated like a racial minority. She has to deal with assumptions, side-long looks, racist remarks, and cultural misunderstandings. While the American kids think of her as exotic, however, the narrative never does. She's simply a teenage girl, like any other. She has her own quirks, of course, but no more or less than Cat, the girl whose family Sejal is staying with.

Fat Vam...more One of the best things about the book is its handling of Sejal. She's sent from India to stay with an American family and is treated like a racial minority. She has to deal with assumptions, side-long looks, racist remarks, and cultural misunderstandings. While the American kids think of her as exotic, however, the narrative never does. She's simply a teenage girl, like any other. She has her own quirks, of course, but no more or less than Cat, the girl whose family Sejal is staying with.

Fat Vampire is very self-aware, and while that doesn't always work for me, it did here. In a lot of ways, the book is a subversion of every other YA fantasy/horror novel out there. It explores a variety of vampire myths and how they might co-exist, references other books in the genre (everything from Stoker's Dracula to Gaiman's Sandman) and pokes a bit at the expectation that the protagonist of the YA novel will always get the girl/guy. After having established itself as a novel that embraces variety, with teens of different races and sexual orientations presented, it has this to say:

Doug, for his part, didn't think he really had much of an opinion about gay people. He didn't know any. Except maybe Ophelia, now. If anything, he was possibly a little sick of them. They were always popping up in shows and movies and in the books he read. They used to be comic relief, but at some point it was like you weren't allowed to laugh anymore, and the gay characters were Very Serious. Their whole character would be about them being gay, and how serious and unfunny and also completely normal it was. In each new book, especially, there seemed to be one or two. Like the author wanted to prove what an open-minded, big-tent guy he was.

This paragraph is loaded with so very many things, it's hard to know where to start. First, it's a pretty honest dissection of the depictions of LGBT characters in popular fiction. It's also very much the author poking fun at himself. And it's an interesting look at the main character, who is growing steadily less sympathetic and likeable. A few chapters earlier, when faced with evidence that Ophelia was likely gay or bisexual, Doug and the rest of the teens in his social group were pretty non-reactive. "Oh, her hot date's a chick? That's cool." It's not until later in the book, when Doug makes his transition into jerkland, that he starts analyzing things and decides he's sick of gay people. There's actually a lot of that sort of thing going on in the book, where there's a lot more going on than would appear on the surface. The reference to Sandman, for example, is far more of an ingenius insertion than a mere throwaway mention.

The end of the book is one of those that will divide people. Usually I try not to divulge endings, but in this case the ending is impossible to spoil because of its ambiguity. Readers will either love it and think it's genius or hate it and wish for something more concrete. Basically, the last chapter runs through several possible scenarios for an ending instead of picking one and narrating to the end. It also runs through "alternate histories" as food for thought, things such as "what if he had become a werewolf," "if he'd been born a Russian" or "if Jay had been the vampire instead." Personally, after having spent more than 300 pages with these characters, I would have liked a more definitive answer as to what happened to them. Then again, nothing else about this book is standard, so why should the ending be?(less)

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Feb 10, 2012 Emma rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I love Paranormals. No, seriously, I like love LOVE them and I loved this book. I picked it up on a whim. *shrugs* Something about promising myself I'd read more male authors and more YA. This book fit the bill for both. I started reading it while I was being traumatized during a hospital visit and it totally made the torture pass by so much quicker. That and since I was laughing so hard (Two words: Panda scene) almost convinced hospital personnel I needed some special alone time in a padded roo...more

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Jul 17, 2011 Beckie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I've laughed about the idea of this story ever since I heard about it: a 16-year-old kid named Doug gets turned into a vampire before he loses weight (he was working on it, promise!) and has to be stuck looking that way for all eternity.

Hilarious, right? But the writing was So. Much. Funnier than that. I loved his best friend Jay, who, being equally nerdy, attends Comic-Con with him, the only place where Doug can act naturally and completely fit in. And the girl has an exotic flair too - Sejal...more

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Mar 13, 2011 Alexis rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011

This book had a lot of promise and was a different take on the vampire genre.

Our premise- a dorky 15-year-old is transformed into a vampire. He's overweight, nerdy and definitely not sexy. There was a lot of humour in this book- he goes to Comic Con and steals blood from people donating to receive free comics, and the part where he tries to turn into a bat was quite funny.

However, the novelist attempted to try and get some kind of message about getting over homophobia into the narrative. I was...more

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Feb 24, 2011 Manda rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

First off, I have to say I ALWAYS have a problem with male leads. I don’t know if it’s because I don’t relate or what, but I always have a hard time with books with male leads. I, however, loved Doug Lee from the beginning. Adam Rex created this socially awkward teen guy that had the ability to pull me into his life immediately. I really enjoyed this book. It took the whole vampire phenomenon going on in literature recently and put a fun, humorous spin on it.

I not only enjoyed the main character...more

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Feb 15, 2011 Novel Novice rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book that made me laugh out loud as much as Fat Vampire by Adam Rex. I mean literally, sitting in bed, home alone and cracking up. Loud, hysterical laughter. Laughter so hard, I had to put down the book to compose myself, then call my mom to read her a passage, and insist that she read this book the minute I was done with it. (She now has it in her possession. And then my dad has dibs.)

Fat Vampire tells the story of Doug, who finds himself accidentally a v...more It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book that made me laugh out loud as much as Fat Vampire by Adam Rex. I mean literally, sitting in bed, home alone and cracking up. Loud, hysterical laughter. Laughter so hard, I had to put down the book to compose myself, then call my mom to read her a passage, and insist that she read this book the minute I was done with it. (She now has it in her possession. And then my dad has dibs.)

Fat Vampire tells the story of Doug, who finds himself accidentally a vampire, and therefore facing an eternity of life as a chubby 15-year-old. Doomed to never slim down. Doomed to never get his driver’s license (legally, at least). Doomed to sucking the blood from unsuspecting cows because he can’t even get the goth girls at school to go for his vampire story. Oh, and while he’s coming to grips with his not-so-sparkly life as a vampire and coping with his crush on the new foreign exchange student, Doug’s also being chased by the team of the TV show “Vampire Hunters.” No big, right?

Rex writes with a dry, sarcastic tone that lends itself perfectly to this story and its characters. It’s no-nonsense and that’s what makes this outrageous story work so well. He just tells it like it is, so that there’s no questioning the supernatural elements. As the reader, you just go with it. And yet, Rex uses this simplistic prose to create such colorful scenes that you can see each moment play out so clearly. He weaves together such vivid imagery that the story and characters come to life as you’re reading.

Rex also injects Fat Vampire with the perfect amount of pop culture references, whether real or fictional (including a thinly veiled take on the cult classic vampire movie, “The Lost Boys”). Two of the pop culture highlights include Doug and his best friend Jay cavorting through San Diego Comic Con (all while Doug tries to dodge the sunlight in a poncho) and a colorful scene set during a midnight screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” (a tradition older readers, especially, will appreciate).

Fat Vampire is marketed as a Young Adult book — and while it definitely is a book about teens and would appeal to teen readers — I would hardly limit it to this branding. This book has broad cross-over appeals amongst readers of both genders and all ages (though maybe not readers too young, since there are some F-bombs and other mature subjects addressed).

Rex has created a classic farce on the vampire genre and the coming of age story, while crafting a story that is uniquely his own. You will laugh at Doug. You will feel sorry for Doug. You’ll probably want to punch Doug at some point, and tell him to get himself together. But no matter how you feel, you’ll definitely feel something. Fat Vampire is one of those books that’s so funny you forget it’s making you excited to keep turning the page.(less)

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Feb 11, 2011 Jonathan Dor added it · review of another edition

Jonathan Dor
Freshmen English
2/14/11 Fat Vampire

Do you believe that you can get everything you want or that you can change for a special someone? This is how fifteen-year-old Doug Lee felt when he tried to catch the attention of an exchanged student.
Have you ever felt that you didn’t fit in with the crowd and that you wanted to change how your appearance looks to catch the interest of a person that you have feelings for? This is how fifteen-year-old Doug Lee felt in the book Fat Vampire by Adam...more Jonathan Dor
Freshmen English
2/14/11 Fat Vampire

Do you believe that you can get everything you want or that you can change for a special someone? This is how fifteen-year-old Doug Lee felt when he tried to catch the attention of an exchanged student.
Have you ever felt that you didn’t fit in with the crowd and that you wanted to change how your appearance looks to catch the interest of a person that you have feelings for? This is how fifteen-year-old Doug Lee felt in the book Fat Vampire by Adam Rex. He is trying to catch the interest of a real live girl that he had no chance of getting because he is over-weight, a dork and a newbie vampire. The Doug tries to change all of this to get the real live girl that he wants, but he knows this will very challenging for him. The girl name is Sejal and she is a gorgeous Indian exchange student, he wants to kiss her, but he is having a hard time getting close to her because his fangs are telling him to bite her but doesn’t want to. He draws blood from local dairy cows but he wants the blood of humans not animals. Doug Lee wasn’t born a vampire, he was turned into a vampire by a staving newbie vampire, and he was just at the wrong place at a wrong time. When he was turned into a vampire, he was fat and fifteen and once you’re turned into a vampire, you age and appearance will never change. Doug does realize that this will be challenging for him to kiss this girl, but he still want to try.
This book was an original vampire book. This was an okay written book, the book was written in third person because it was written for everything Doug did and what he was thinking. The main character was Doug and then his best friend Jay join along towards the beginning of the story.
I would recommend this book to people how like vampires or people that want to hear something funny. I enjoyed this book, because it was very funny and made me laugh a lot. Adam Rex grew Phoenix, Arizona he is the middle child. He met his wife at the University of Arizona. He spends most of his time on the Internet and reading books. Adam Rex also likes animals, spaceman and food. The book Fat Vampire by Adam Rex was a very entertaining book and it was a very good book.
(less)

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Jan 18, 2011 Karin rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: vampires, fantasy, quirky, funny, high-school, transfer-students, teenagers, reality-television, internet-narcissism, young-adult-fiction, supernatural, friendship, dating, awkward-boys, borrowed-from-the-library

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Doug (high schooler) is short and on the heavy side when he’s bitten by the vampire, and he’s completely bummed that it doesn’t immediately transform him into an undead teenage sex god. In fact, he looks and acts almost exactly the same (sarcastic, awkward), except that now his skin is super sensitive to the sun, he can’t fall asleep after dark, and he has to drink blood. It’s not exactly glamorous. In his attempts to feed, Doug’s exploits come to the attention of a TV show called Vampire Hunter...more Doug (high schooler) is short and on the heavy side when he’s bitten by the vampire, and he’s completely bummed that it doesn’t immediately transform him into an undead teenage sex god. In fact, he looks and acts almost exactly the same (sarcastic, awkward), except that now his skin is super sensitive to the sun, he can’t fall asleep after dark, and he has to drink blood. It’s not exactly glamorous. In his attempts to feed, Doug’s exploits come to the attention of a TV show called Vampire Hunters – which is about to be canceled (they’ve never actually found any evidence of or tracked down any real vampires). They’re desperate for something to increase their ratings and will stop at nothing to find Doug. Meanwhile, Doug finds himself attracted to an exchange student from India – Sejal – who is currently living in the states because she has “The Google” (an obsession with checking herself out online), and her parents want to get her away from her virtual life so she can recover. Sejal seems to know exactly what Doug is, despite his attempts to conceal it. And Doug has to see a vampire counselor to learn more about his new life, er…death. There’s also a mystery surrounding the identity of the vampire that made Doug (as well as a bunch of other teenagers). Will Doug blossom into an attractive, self-confident, blood-sucker who gets the girl? Probably not.

I wanted to like Doug, but he was sort of a pill, and I was ambivalent about his actions and motives. I loved Sejal, though, and the book itself was smart and funny (and exactly the kind of quirky that I enjoy). There are a lot of good, quotable lines. Still not sure about Doug. The TV crew does track him down, and there’s a big blood bath as they shoot at everything that moves with their Redeemers (stake firing weapons). And Doug does take a stake for Sejal, so maybe he’s not a bad guy after all. Abrupt and ambiguous ending, but entertaining nonetheless. It’s a nice change from the supernatural vampire romance genre for sure.(less)

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Jan 14, 2011 Nina rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I've been eyeing this in bookstores ever since one of my friends mentioned this book to me. Just like I Kissed A Zombie and I Liked It, I thought this would make a really funny paranormal story so I totally wanted to read it. However, the book was too pricey and I could do without it anyway. So it was a very fun surprise that one of my friends got me this when I got sick this week - sort of a 'Get Well Soon gift,' and I must say, just looking at the cover almost made me better. The cover itself...more I've been eyeing this in bookstores ever since one of my friends mentioned this book to me. Just like I Kissed A Zombie and I Liked It, I thought this would make a really funny paranormal story so I totally wanted to read it. However, the book was too pricey and I could do without it anyway. So it was a very fun surprise that one of my friends got me this when I got sick this week - sort of a 'Get Well Soon gift,' and I must say, just looking at the cover almost made me better. The cover itself is funny, with that 'blood slushie' thing going on that really makes me laugh.

The story is about a fat, pudgy, unattractive 15-year-old boy - Doug "Meatball" Lee - who was at the wrong place at the wrong time, becoming a victim to a newly-made vampire, which turned him into a vampire himself. Interesting? Definitely. So I was totally into reading this as it was very different from typical vampire stories where vampires were attractive, sexy, and romantic beings who lured their victims with their charm and cunning. Doug is clumsy, insecure, and of course, fat. I was very curious how this story would go - would he be a different breed of Edward and find his own Bella? Would he ever become badass? As human psychology dictates, we naturally gravitate to the underdogs, and Doug is definitely that.

First chapters into the story and I was really laughing out loud. Why shouldn't I? Just read these:

"I’m a vampire! I’m a fat vampire, okay? I was trying to lose weight before I got bitten. Now I’m screwed."

"...You know I haven’t had anything to eat or drink except blood for the last month? And nothing. No change. If I can’t lose weight on an all-blood Diet—"

Weren't those funny? I was laughing the whole time while reading through those chapters. But alas! Like a vampire that has suddenly appeared and drunk the blood from this book, it suddenly changed to a not-as-compelling-and-not-as-funny kind of story. The characters had a lot of promise, especially Dough and Senjal, but despite their amazing back stories - Doug as a fat vampire and Senjal as an exchange student recovering from 'The Google,' a bad case of becoming an internet troll - they've become cardboard-flat and one-dimensional. I thought their stories were worth exploring, and I believed that would happen but no, the joke in Doug as a fat vampire suddenly became very old, and Senjal turned into a very flat character. She just stayed in the sidelines, talking when she's supposed to, acting like she's supposed to, having a lot of opinions but never voicing them. It was frustrating reading about these two 'not develop' into the characters they were supposed to become in the end. But I guess that's where the 'A Never Coming of Age Story' comes in. And here I am thinking that that statement was just a joke in the title.

Even the villain - whose story closely resembles that of The Sandman by Neil Gaiman, was too dull. This story had a lot of laughing moments in spite of it turning into an unpromising novel, but I never once laughed at anything that this villain said or did. There was nothing likable nor 'hatable' about him. Frankly, this story could have done without him.

The story starts with Doug as a pudgy and uncool vampire, then he changes into a mysteriously cool and blase vampire. He drops his bestfriend, confronts the girl he likes, and almost kills his girlfriend. I never liked the changes that happen to Doug, I never even liked Doug that much in the first place. He was whiny, selfish, and uncaring about others - and that's when he was just an uncool kid. But when he started acting like a hot vampire, his attitude grew even worse. At first, I sympathized with his attitude because I was thinking that was his defense mechanism in order to cope with being a geek and unpopular, but cruelty and taking advantage of your friend? I thought that was too much.

This book also digressed A LOT. There was the main plot, and then some minor plots were introduced without ever being resolved. Some interesting characters that never got explored, more interesting plots that never got finished. Seriously, this story had a lot of stories - if not potential - that would have made this book better than what it has become.

The writing and the premise were both great. But I did not care about the execution. Seriously, there were more than a hundred ways this story could have turned out and it would be way better than this one actually became. Even the ending could have been better, instead of sounding like the author just wrote a hasty ending in order to meet his deadline.

To be a total geek about it: this book was full of high-tech features, but it was just used as a calculator. Didn't get that? That's the point.

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Dec 21, 2010 Susan rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult

In the slew of vampire books that have hit the YA market since a certain saga launched, some of them have tried to take a stab (bite?) at the humorous approach (Catherine Jinks' Reformed Vampire Support Group, Sucks to be Me, etc.) Some have succeeded with a decent amount of charm (Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side but after reading Rex's book, it seems that half as succeeded so well as his at actually being flat-out FUNNY. One of Rex's real fortes is his dialogue; he has a whip-sharp i...more

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Oct 07, 2010 Laura rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, young-adult, vampires, funny

I wasn't sure what to expect with this book. I decided to read/listen to it because of the title and cover. Judging a book by it's cover in this case turned out well. Doug finds himself a vampire. He doesn't look like typical vampire and he doesn't really want to be one. He's 15, short, a little chubby. He loves comic books and goes to Comic Con (another reason to love the book). But a vampire he is. He's told one person, his best friend Jay. Together they get into some trouble with Pandas and C...more

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Sep 17, 2010 Gecky Boz rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

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

This book gets a 2 out of 5 gnomes, It has a brilliant premise for pretty much the first half of the book but then it kind of throws that right out the window towards the end and the main character becomes unlikeable.

This book was really kind of disappointing. I was drawn in by the cover and the synopsis. I was the first person to even request it from the library.

Ok, first the premise, Doug is fifteen and now a vampire but he wasn't good looking when he became a vampire hence the...more Fallacious Fat

This book gets a 2 out of 5 gnomes, It has a brilliant premise for pretty much the first half of the book but then it kind of throws that right out the window towards the end and the main character becomes unlikeable.

This book was really kind of disappointing. I was drawn in by the cover and the synopsis. I was the first person to even request it from the library.

Ok, first the premise, Doug is fifteen and now a vampire but he wasn't good looking when he became a vampire hence the title Fat Vampire. The only other person he tells about being a vampire is his best friend Jay. The have some very funny escapades in the beginning of the book that involve going to Comic Con and a blood mobile. Doug usually gets his blood from cows but they have quite the trip to the zoo that involves a panda mom, a baby panda, and a video camera. Doug escapes but is seen on tape by the camera.

Then comes in the other very entertaining part of this book, the Vampire Hunters TV show. The host of this show is seen as being pretty much certifiable by his staff. All they usually do is track down European guys with bad accents and lately have shows of them shooting dummies with stake guns. Then they see a video and he's sure that there is a real vampire out there aka Doug.

There is humor to be found in this book, the beginning is chock full of funny. My favorite part is when Doug is trying to transform into a bat but gets stuck halfway thus looking pretty horrifying. Another great part is the story that Doug tells and the true story about who actually made Doug a vampire.

The love interest of the book, Sejal, seems like she is going to fit well into the book but she just doesn't. She has the Google, which is portrayed like severe internet addiction. When you find out here whole story it just makes her unlikeable. She seems like a character that didn't even need to be added to the book.

Overall I really wish the book would have continued along like the first part where it was just Doug and Jay and the Vampire Hunters TV show that is after Doug. When you bring in a love interest who is not interested, and a group or new and old vampires that are supposed to mentor the new vampires, things just kind of fall apart.

The minute Doug starts taking blood from a human he turns into a well to put it nicely, a jerk. Technically though he should have been changing into a jerk earlier/become better looking from the blood that he stole from a blood mobile earlier in the book. He even acts like a superhero at one point but nothing ever comes of that part of the story.

The ending, wow, it made me really mad I won't spoil it for you but I hate when endings make no sense or just seem lazy.

This had the creative potential to be truly awesome but alas the author did not put the pieces together in a pleasing way.(less)

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Aug 09, 2010 Lielabell rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

There is nothing to like about this book. And, believe me, I wanted to like it. I wanted to like it so much.

Doug, the main character, is fifteen, fat, and a vampire. He isn't cool. He'll never be cool, and his life is, quite literally, over. Plus, he's a total comic book fanboy. To the point where the book starts at Comic Con. With a premise like that, this book should have been a slam dunk.

But... it wasn't. It failed on all levels. Doug goes from being nerdy and awesome to obnoxious and annoy...more There is nothing to like about this book. And, believe me, I wanted to like it. I wanted to like it so much.

Doug, the main character, is fifteen, fat, and a vampire. He isn't cool. He'll never be cool, and his life is, quite literally, over. Plus, he's a total comic book fanboy. To the point where the book starts at Comic Con. With a premise like that, this book should have been a slam dunk.

But... it wasn't. It failed on all levels. Doug goes from being nerdy and awesome to obnoxious and annoying. He drops his best friend, starts acting like an ass in an attempt to be popular and almost kills his 'girlfriend'. And does he feel any remorse? Does he do anything to redeem himself? NO. Not at all. He doesn't even die like I sort of hoped he would. He just... flails uselessly on the ground for a bit.

And the other main character, Senjal, isn't any better. Once again, she should have been awesome. She has a totally believe back story as a former internet troll. I'm not sure how I feel about 'the google,' which is supposed to be some form of sever internet addiction, but it did make for an interesting discussion of what it means to be living in an overly analyzed digital world. But, she doesn't ever do anything. Senjal serves primarily as an object of desire for Doug, which I can understand. A boy, especially a fanboy, needs to have a crush. Still, you would think that there would be more to her, since half of the book is seen through her POV. Instead she just short of drifts through the world she inhabits, not expressing much of an opinion about anything, tagging along with her host sister and trying to make up for her shady internet past.

Now, I could totally be cool with that if Adam Rex was making the point that she cannot connect because of her deep immersion into the world wide web, but that's not the vibe you get at all when reading her. It is clear that she is meant to be the hero of the piece, the person who dealt with her past and moved on to a, hopefully, beautiful future.

Senjal is the one who figures out what Dough is. Senjal is the one who pieces together who the villain of book the is. Senjal dispenses what is meant to be ground shaking words of wisdom as Doug lays not-dying on the ground. But all of it just comes off as flat and one dimensional as she is.

And since I mentioned it, the villain. WTF. Seriously? The gay vampire is the bad guy? And he's the one who turned all the homecoming king clones? And not a single one of those clones is confident enough with his sexuality to say that it was a creepy old guy that attacked them? They all had to invent a story about some hot, French babe? Seriously?

And the evil gay vampire of doom was just... such a let down. His actions make no sense. I mean, I can understand turning guys who look like his long lost love, but why did he go stalking Senjal? And why attack Doug's best friend? There was a tangential connection between what he was doing and what was done in The Sandman, which was conveniently discussed by two characters earlier in the book, but even that was weak.

Idk, I can forgive a lot in a book. I tend to look for that silver lining, to connect with the minor characters, and to find meaning in the littlest things. But Fat Vampire fended off all of my attempts to understand it, let alone enjoy it. Random characters were introduced, then vanish with no explanation. Plot lines showed up, meandered for a bit, and then disappeared without coming to any sort of conclusion or furthering the over arching plot at all; and amazing ideas (like a vampire super hero) were toyed with just long enough to get my hopes up and then never mentioned again.

So yeah. There is nothing to like about Fat Vampire. Nothing at all. (less)

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Jan 29, 2010 Paula Gallagher rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I wanted to love this book, I really did. Smekday is one of my all-time favorite middle grade novels--funny, inventive and quotable. The illustrations are superb.

But this book is a mess. Rex never gets a handle on point of view, so the narration is a mix of kind-of Doug and then kind-of Sejal and a snarkily witty omniscient voice. Sadly, it never gels.

The first few chapters are laugh-out-loud promising, placing newly vampired Doug in San Diego for Comic Con. Yes! A nerd-boy vampire from the Phil...more I wanted to love this book, I really did. Smekday is one of my all-time favorite middle grade novels--funny, inventive and quotable. The illustrations are superb.

But this book is a mess. Rex never gets a handle on point of view, so the narration is a mix of kind-of Doug and then kind-of Sejal and a snarkily witty omniscient voice. Sadly, it never gels.

The first few chapters are laugh-out-loud promising, placing newly vampired Doug in San Diego for Comic Con. Yes! A nerd-boy vampire from the Philly 'burbs, none too sparkly sexy. Awkward as hell, feeding on cows. Converted by a guy vampire (ugh!)near Hickory Run in the Poconos. (A favorite detail of mine, as it was a favorite childhood destination.) Then Indian exchange student Sejal appears, and evertyhing goes downhill. Too much telling, not enough showing. A victim of social networking addiction, "a case of the Google," brings her to America and a host family with no more technology than dial-up on a Pentium II.

The gang of high school friends are assembled, and with the exception of Cat (Sejal's host-sister), none are memorable. The description of a night out at Rocky Horror is groaningly painful--"Abby met them dressed like a syphilitic French maid." It sounds like it's written from the POV of a clueless adult rather than a virgin teen. And what's the point of naming a character after yourself, Adam? A confrontation erupts in " a floral rococo of virtuoso cursing." Huh? "But these were mostly drama kids, so the girls were more prone to histrionics, and the boys were more likely to throw parties than punches." You lost me, Adam (the writer). Show! Write the scene!

Doug begins to find his vampire roots with the help of gay-vamp mentor Stephin. He longs for Sejal. He becomes distant from his best friend, Jay. A TV reality show, Vampire Hunters, is added to the sloppy mix.

And by the end, I didn't care what happened to Doug, Sejal, or anyone else. Which was a good thing, as resolution is an elusive thing in this rambling tome.
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Jul 25, 2011 Book Twirps rated it 4 of 5 stars

Doug is having a hard time getting the hang of this whole vampire thing. First of all, he is only about 5’5 and overweight. He’d been meaning to workout and lose some weight, but he was bitten before he could do that, so now he is eternally damned to be forever fat. It’s not exactly an ideal situation for a vampire. To make matters worse, he has no idea what he is doing. There’s no manual, he has no mentor, and everything that Bram Stoker wrote in Dracula seems to be wrong. He is afraid of turni...more Doug is having a hard time getting the hang of this whole vampire thing. First of all, he is only about 5’5 and overweight. He’d been meaning to workout and lose some weight, but he was bitten before he could do that, so now he is eternally damned to be forever fat. It’s not exactly an ideal situation for a vampire. To make matters worse, he has no idea what he is doing. There’s no manual, he has no mentor, and everything that Bram Stoker wrote in Dracula seems to be wrong. He is afraid of turning other people into vampires, so he feeds on cows and other unsuspecting animals. When he and his best friend Jay attend Comic-Con in San Diego, Doug attempts to feed on a panda in the San Diego zoo. Unbeknownst to him, there is a live panda cam recording his attempt. Soon, the video is on YouTube and the people behind a fake reality series titled “Vampire Hunters” get ahold of the footage in hopes of finding their first real vampire and upping their ratings.

When Doug returns to school he is immediately smitten with Sejal, the foreign exchange student from India. Sejal has been sent to America by her parents who hope to cure her of “The Google” (an internet afflicted disease). He also runs into his maker and eventually they are introduced to a group of older vampires who agree to mentor them. As the reality TV hounds begin honing in on Doug’s location, Doug begins to wonder if he can maybe be cured of his vampirism. He remembers a movie where the newly created vamps were able to kill their maker and return themselves to true human form. But is he ready to go back to being a regular, dorky dude and lose these cool new powers? If he does, will he stand any kind of chance with Sejal?

For the most part I really enjoyed Fat Vampire: A Never Coming of Age Story. The premise is genius. Doug is the anti-Edward. He and his friend Jay are funny and lovable. Adam Rex’s writing is wicked and clever and the characters are all engaging. My only problem with this one was that the storyline seemed to be too big for the length of the book. I felt a lot of plot lines fell flat, some of my favorite characters just disappeared, and some of the scenes felt rushed. Had this book been longer the multiple plots would have had more room to breathe and these characters could have grown more. Still, the book is worth reading, especially if you want a fresh, funny new take on vampires.

One last thing – try googling uncombable hair syndrome and check out the images it brings up. If you read the book, you’ll get it immediately.(less)

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Jul 28, 2010 Baby T-Rex rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the first book I can remember being so angry at that I wanted to throw it across the room. I think my extreme frustration partly stems from the fact that I wanted to love it. I loved the premise, I saw Adam Rex at Comic Con and he was awesome, and I snagged a signed copy of this book there. I started reading it that night (it starts in Comic Con as a nice bonus) and it was funny and nerdy and Doug and Jay were great as geeky best friends trying to figure out Doug's new life as a vampire....more

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