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Saint-Germain #9
Mansions of Darkness
Ambitious in its scope and provocative in its content, the saga of Count Saint-Germain is a monumental feat of the imagination. Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's powerful and evocative novels have captured Saint-Germain throughout his long existence, from the temples of ancient Eygpt to our present century.
Now the count's endless travels bring him to seventeenth-century Peru, where he finds solace for his loneliness in the arms of an Incan priestess. But mighty Spain has conquered the Incan people--and brought the dreaded attention of the Holy Inquisition to the New World.
Now the count's endless travels bring him to seventeenth-century Peru, where he finds solace for his loneliness in the arms of an Incan priestess. But mighty Spain has conquered the Incan people--and brought the dreaded attention of the Holy Inquisition to the New World.
432 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
1 person is currently reading
307 people want to read
About the author
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
259 books477 followersA professional writer for more than forty years, Yarbro has sold over eighty books, more than seventy works of short fiction, and more than three dozen essays, introductions, and reviews. She also composes serious music. Her first professional writing - in 1961-1962 - was as a playwright for a now long-defunct children's theater company. By the mid-60s she had switched to writing stories and hasn't stopped yet.
After leaving college in 1963 and until she became a full-time writer in 1970, she worked as a demographic cartographer, and still often drafts maps for her books, and occasionally for the books of other writers.
She has a large reference library with books on a wide range of subjects, everything from food and fashion to weapons and trade routes to religion and law. She is constantly adding to it as part of her on-going fascination with history and culture; she reads incessantly, searching for interesting people and places that might provide fodder for stories.
In 1997 the Transylvanian Society of Dracula bestowed a literary knighthood on Yarbro, and in 2003 the World Horror Association presented her with a Grand Master award. In 2006 the International Horror Guild enrolled her among their Living Legends, the first woman to be so honored; the Horror Writers Association gave her a Life Achievement Award in 2009. In 2014 she won a Life Achievement Award from the World Fantasy Convention.
A skeptical occultist for forty years, she has studied everything from alchemy to zoomancy, and in the late 1970s worked occasionally as a professional tarot card reader and palmist at the Magic Cellar in San Francisco.
She has two domestic accomplishments: she is a good cook and an experienced seamstress. The rest is catch-as-catch-can.
Divorced, she lives in the San Francisco Bay Area - with two cats: the irrepressible Butterscotch and Crumpet, the Gang of Two. When not busy writing, she enjoys the symphony or opera.
Her Saint-Germain series is now the longest vampire series ever. The books range widely over time and place, and were not published in historical order. They are numbered in published order.
Known pseudonyms include Vanessa Pryor, Quinn Fawcett, T.C.F. Hopkins, Trystam Kith, Camille Gabor.
After leaving college in 1963 and until she became a full-time writer in 1970, she worked as a demographic cartographer, and still often drafts maps for her books, and occasionally for the books of other writers.
She has a large reference library with books on a wide range of subjects, everything from food and fashion to weapons and trade routes to religion and law. She is constantly adding to it as part of her on-going fascination with history and culture; she reads incessantly, searching for interesting people and places that might provide fodder for stories.
In 1997 the Transylvanian Society of Dracula bestowed a literary knighthood on Yarbro, and in 2003 the World Horror Association presented her with a Grand Master award. In 2006 the International Horror Guild enrolled her among their Living Legends, the first woman to be so honored; the Horror Writers Association gave her a Life Achievement Award in 2009. In 2014 she won a Life Achievement Award from the World Fantasy Convention.
A skeptical occultist for forty years, she has studied everything from alchemy to zoomancy, and in the late 1970s worked occasionally as a professional tarot card reader and palmist at the Magic Cellar in San Francisco.
She has two domestic accomplishments: she is a good cook and an experienced seamstress. The rest is catch-as-catch-can.
Divorced, she lives in the San Francisco Bay Area - with two cats: the irrepressible Butterscotch and Crumpet, the Gang of Two. When not busy writing, she enjoys the symphony or opera.
Her Saint-Germain series is now the longest vampire series ever. The books range widely over time and place, and were not published in historical order. They are numbered in published order.
Known pseudonyms include Vanessa Pryor, Quinn Fawcett, T.C.F. Hopkins, Trystam Kith, Camille Gabor.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 16, 2009
Saint Germain, who mourns his own lost and forgotten people, travels to South America in the 17th century looking for a glimpse of the native culture before it is erased by the conquering Spanish and the Catholic church. He repeatedly flees religious fanatics and other bad guys, and he's terribly unlucky in love. Overall this is a very sad book. A good entertaining read, although there is nothing spectacular here.
June 8, 2011
Loved it! had a hard time putting it down. The way she weaves the story with historical and geographical facts is amazing.
September 1, 2018
This is the second novel in this series I have read and this one was better because it had more plot.
It also inspired a prayer request which my church's prayer team is praying over:
For Vampires, time travelers, and any who find themselves outside time. For those characters (and people in real life) who are the last, are lonely, could use a hug, wander, or who need comfort.
So I hope that the character San Germanno knows he is loved and he is being surrounded with love, kindness, joy, hope, and other good things. I worry about him. Too many mistreat him or shun him because he is a vampire.
It also inspired a prayer request which my church's prayer team is praying over:
For Vampires, time travelers, and any who find themselves outside time. For those characters (and people in real life) who are the last, are lonely, could use a hug, wander, or who need comfort.
So I hope that the character San Germanno knows he is loved and he is being surrounded with love, kindness, joy, hope, and other good things. I worry about him. Too many mistreat him or shun him because he is a vampire.
November 27, 2021
While the whole Saint Germain series has always been about how he is in many ways more Human than humans are, this one brings it home even more so. One of the better ones in the series that I've read lately.
June 14, 2012
ahhhh... so sad... the most depressing of the Saint-Germain stories... this time he goes by Francisco San Germanno... this time he and Rogerio go to Peru, Saint-Germain wants to study the ways of the Inca before they disappear...
and he tries love twice - is rejected twice - once by the last of the Incan royalty, Acanna Tupac, 40ish, the last of her kin... and though she shares love with San Germanno, once he tells her she is of his blood (he has been with her too many times), she sacrifices herself in Incan high dress of feathers and mask, burning herself and jumping off a high bridge, rather than to be vampire...
and then, as he came under the scrutiny of a disgruntled head priest, who manages to get him arrested for healing without calling on god the father, so he and Rogerio head into the deeps of Peru and Acapulco with, Oaxetli, a blind, young Indian woman, raised by nuns and who speaks manynative languages... after a month they come across a cultish village, where a priest visited 100 years earlier, left his whore/priestess, and promises to return... and 100 years later, Germanno is identified as the priest returned, and Germanno's truth is rejected. they are held hostage, Germanno has his kind of sex with Oaxetli, Oaxetli is grossed out by who he is (though she tries to be balanced about it) and they poison Oaxetli, she dies, and they crucify Germanno - he is burned in the sun for 3 days before Rogerio is able to secure a hiding place and rescue him... it takes him 3 months to recover enough to trouble (taking blood from animals)... they have a last confrontation with the village, & Germanno turns the villagers against the priestess, using her own words...
In the other books, Germanno has been more successful in his dealings... more successful in his relationships... here he is not... and the Spainard priests and governors and soldiers are in the new world because they are disgraced in regular Spain (bastards, or not conforming to the church, or...) and they, for the most part, treat the natives with disdain, and are convinced they are hiding gold and silver, and mistreat them as they try to findit... just depressing all around.
and he tries love twice - is rejected twice - once by the last of the Incan royalty, Acanna Tupac, 40ish, the last of her kin... and though she shares love with San Germanno, once he tells her she is of his blood (he has been with her too many times), she sacrifices herself in Incan high dress of feathers and mask, burning herself and jumping off a high bridge, rather than to be vampire...
and then, as he came under the scrutiny of a disgruntled head priest, who manages to get him arrested for healing without calling on god the father, so he and Rogerio head into the deeps of Peru and Acapulco with, Oaxetli, a blind, young Indian woman, raised by nuns and who speaks manynative languages... after a month they come across a cultish village, where a priest visited 100 years earlier, left his whore/priestess, and promises to return... and 100 years later, Germanno is identified as the priest returned, and Germanno's truth is rejected. they are held hostage, Germanno has his kind of sex with Oaxetli, Oaxetli is grossed out by who he is (though she tries to be balanced about it) and they poison Oaxetli, she dies, and they crucify Germanno - he is burned in the sun for 3 days before Rogerio is able to secure a hiding place and rescue him... it takes him 3 months to recover enough to trouble (taking blood from animals)... they have a last confrontation with the village, & Germanno turns the villagers against the priestess, using her own words...
In the other books, Germanno has been more successful in his dealings... more successful in his relationships... here he is not... and the Spainard priests and governors and soldiers are in the new world because they are disgraced in regular Spain (bastards, or not conforming to the church, or...) and they, for the most part, treat the natives with disdain, and are convinced they are hiding gold and silver, and mistreat them as they try to findit... just depressing all around.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 21, 2022
I give this one three stars.The women in the Saint Germain series don't have much luck do they.I think i like the ones set in europe better.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 28, 2009
For some reason, the Count's adventures as seem better outside of Europe. Here, Yarbro paints a picture of Peru during the time of Conquest.
May 26, 2016
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November 16, 2015
St. Germain is a great character but I found the book a little hard to get into at times. Maybe I should start with the first in the series.
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September 1, 2013St. Germain (Peru, 1642-1649) Book 10
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews