Perhaps having recently read A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens made it difficult to enjoy Sarah Gray's reboot, A Vampire Christmas Carol. (Or I could just be really burnt out on vampires and their rampant [over]use in books, film and TV.) Gray's was a strong idea and she did manage to create an interesting backstory and explanation for Scrooge's character and lifestyle. But something just felt off for me.

The first four chapters were rather clunky and hard to connect with. Also, the narrator seemed judgy and somewhat offensive. It took a good deal of work for me to push through the prose, which didn't quite hit the mark. (Keep in mind I loved the original and have no issue with older styles of prose.) I wonder, if Gray would've transplanted Scrooge, and the new world she'd crafted for him, into today's world, being able to then write more modern prose, would she have crafted a story easier and more enjoyable for today's readers? I also would've liked to have seen a lot less of the original text; long passages were copied verbatim.

Overall, 2.5 stars, and that's mostly for Gray's idea, and Dickens' underlying themes remaining intact.