How to Elude a Vampire (VRC 2), by Alice Winters

[Ulysses]

How to Elude a Vampire (Vampire Related Crimes, 2)
BY Alice Winters
Published by the author, 2020
Four stars

Finnegan Hayes is a funny guy. He uses his humor, his relentless banter, to affectionately browbeat his boyfriend Marcus Church, and his various co-workers at the VRC (Vampire-Related Crime) unit into liking him. The author, however, never quite lets the reader forget that this is also a defense mechanism, Finn’s aggressive cuteness, which he uses to shield himself from deep, scarring memories of neglect and abandonment as a child, and the ultimate horror of his abduction and dismemberment at the hands of a shadowy figure who has haunted his dreams since he was sixteen.

Yeah, that’s a lot. In this second of the VRC series, the reader begins to dig deeper into the core of Finn’s nightmares, as the history behind the horror begins to emerge with the discovery of a body in the river next to which Finn and Marcus walk their dogs. For the first time, the fact that both Finn’s beloved, Marcus, and his devoted adoptive father, Orin, are both powerful “true” vampires—able both to consume human food and procreate—makes no difference. The dark presence who stole Finn’s youth from him has returned, for no clear reason, to trigger Finn’s deepest fears and an unexpected feeling of helplessness on the part of those who love him.

Using a rather convenient plot device, Winters introduces Marcus’s twin brother, Claude, who is unlike his dour, grumpy sibling in every way but looks. Claude is a historian, hungry to learn the truth behind his own origins. His research might shed light onto the mysterious presence in Finn’s life, and help the VRC solve the latest in a series of puzzling crimes against vampires as well as humans. Claude is also irritating in the extreme, giving the author another comic avenue to explore.

The leavening in this gruesome story is the evolution of Marcus and Finn’s relationship, the “normal” part of life in which the cranky old vampire, who is used to being fearsome and intimidating, has to try to keep up with his ridiculous little boyfriend, whose tender heart and impish antics give the lie to the darkness that lingers beneath the surface. Between his intense love for their dogs (a new, tiny one arrives in this book) and his desperate need to be loved, Finn keeps the reader (and all of his friends) lurching back and forth between laughter and fear.

Winters takes some fairly extreme liberties with vampire lore, but there’s nothing wrong with that. In a world where vampires are just another part of the population, with their own special police department, you don’t really expect things to be the way they were in Dracula.

The next two books are already on my e-reader. Something to get me through the long pandemic winter.