Book Review: Empire of the Vampire

by Jay Kristoff

Rating: 3.8 stars out of 5

Genre: Horror, fantasy/sci-fi

I have very mixed feelings about this book. Several points throughout I considered not finishing it because while the story was interesting, it was told so slowly that reading it was a chore. 700 pages were not necessary to tell this story— 400 would have sufficed.  It reminded me of ‘The Historian’ in that way– a very good story. I'm glad I read it, but I will never do it again.  

This book was horror, as most vampire/monster books are, but it isn’t the kind of horror that leaves you scared. It’s more akin to the gothic horror novels that have an overarching feeling of dread in the air, an axe hanging over your head waiting to drop. And the depression. My gosh this novel was depressing AF. 

I really liked the idea of silver being inked into warrior priests skin as armor, answering the question of, ‘What is the point of armor against an enemy that can bend metal like butter?’ and the idea that the nuns are the one to do the tattooing was also pretty cool.

Gabriel de Leon by Morgana0anagrom

***Spoilers ahead***

Everyone dies. Especially the women. And the women die the most brutally of all.  Usually after being raped and brutalized first.

I’ve seen some reviews call this book misogynistic. I don’t disagree, but I also didn’t find it to be necessarily a bad thing in this case.  The narrator, Gabriel de Leon, is a man and we’re getting the entire story from his perspective. One could argue that of course the things that stood out to him were things that appealed to the male gaze because the person telling the story is a male and these are the things he would have noticed, thus, I didn’t really have an issue with it.

The way women were depicted and treated in the novel honestly seems on par for how I imagine women were treated in medieval times, and though some reviewers expressed disappointment at this— this book was a horror novel. Of course women were going to be treated in the worst ways possible. Because it’s horrific. 

There is a scene where one of the Princes of Forever comes riding in on a carriage pulled by naked, underage undead girls that he personally hunted down and murdered. 

I feel that the mechanisms for establishing that these vampires, no matter how ‘beautiful’ and ‘powerful’ were disgusting monsters.  There was a lot of graphic underage activity in the novel that perhaps could have been done away with, but again, personally, it seemed an effective device for communicating how monstrous and inhuman these creatures were. The child turned vampire who fed via his mother’s breasts and thighs— it’s the most unchildlike thing imaginable, and I think that was the point. This thing is no longer a child, but a monster.

But that is my own opinion.

I actually really liked the way the female characters were presented in the novel. They all were really fierce and loving.  When Gabriel returned home and found his mother dead, he described her face as being twisted in fierce rage– fighting to get to her daughter. She died as the lion she was. 

Gabriel’s little sister, Celene, ‘my little hellcat’. Who then was tortured and turned into a disfigured vampire by Laure in revenge for Gabriel’s actions.  She loved Gabriel fiercely, and then hated him just as much, rightfully blaming him for what had been done to her (though the vampires were also, obviously responsible).

                Celene Castia  by morgana0anagrom

Dior, the streetrat/holy grail was another interesting female character. I enjoyed her constant fighting and friendship with Gabriel.  The pseudo father-daughter relationship between them was touching and one of the redeeming points of the book.

Dior Lachance  by morgana0anagrom

Astrid Rennier was my other favorite character.  The bastard daughter of Emperor Alexander III sent away by the Emporer’s new wife to be a nun. I don’t know how to describe her other than I liked the fire in her spirit. She had an incredibly strong sense of self and didn’t allow the silver sisterhood to take that from her.

Astrid Rennier  by morgana0anagrom

Concluding thoughts:

This book was so depressing. It was long and difficult to get through. The story was good, if not unique.  Those who called it ‘The Witcher’ + ‘Interview with the Vampire’ were 100% spot on. I would also add that Gabriel de Leon is literally a carbon copy of Trevor Belmont from Netflix’s Castlevania series (which aired four years prior to the publication of this book, so I do think there might have been some ‘inspiration’ there).

I liked some of the messages in the book– that even if all the world turns to shit and you feel like God wants you/the world to suffer, there are still people in the world worth loving and that is what makes life worth living.  People and love are the greatest good. (and evil, by turn).

For the majority of the book (Literally 92%), the emotional waterboarding of depressing gore and hopelessness did not receive an equivalent emotional payout to reward the reader for the pain. And because it’s a horror book, maybe that’s okay, but emotional payout is extremely important to me as a reader. I need light at the end of the tunnel. I need there to be a happy ending and a ‘and they lived happily ever after’ after going through the trenches.  This book definitely does not have that. 

There is a little brightness in the last 7% so you’re not left feeling like taking a bath with a toaster when you finish, but considering that everyone who could have made the happy ending possible died (Astrid + Patience), even the best possible outcome for the sequel will not yield what I consider to be a happy ending. Just an ending.

Some people really enjoy that, and if you do– then this book is for you. It was well written and the prose was very evocative. My favorite description was of his Master and trainer, Greyhand. Paraphrasing: ‘He was a hard man who probably bruised the sheets he slept in and he chewed his food like he hated it’. Jay Kristoff writes very, very brilliant descriptions and characterizations.

I liked the book, but I did not love it, and I will be the first to admit this is out of my ‘romantasy’ genre preference. But having read other horror books, the amount of sad and awfulness in this one took away from the story.

Read Dates: Jan 10-17th. Review is as of January 17th, 2024