Lord Byron was - and is - a vampire. He's still around. And he's prepared to pour out his life story to a young woman who's stumbled across - or perhaps been led into - his secret.

THE VAMPYRE begins fairly slowly. Holland introduces the framing story and gets the ball rolling with a trip to Greece and an encounter with a mysterious individual. There are some hardcore shades of DRACULA in this segment, and they made it tough for me to commit to the book. I've tried to read DRACULA three times, at last count, and I've failed miserably every time. I also found that my own sparse knowledge of this period of Byron's life made it tough for me to become involved with what was going on. It was readable, but I wasn't really engaged.

But I still loved the premise of THE VAMPYRE, so I kept at it. I'm glad I did. The book didn't entirely live up to the high expectations I had going in, but it was still a damned good read.

Once Byron has been vamped, Holland moves into territory that I, at least, was more comfortable with. I loved revisiting these familiar events from a vampiric perspective. I had an absolute blast with it. The book practically seemed to read itself. I'd pick it up and find that I'd devoured thirty or forty pages without realizing it.

It's the style, really, that carried me on through. Holland does a wonderful job of recreating the feel of a Gothic novel. It gave me the same feeling in the back of my throat as I always get from the darker sort of late eighteenth/early nineteenth century literature. It's just steeped in chilling elegance. It's beautiful. It's dark. It's a bit creepy. And as self-possessed as Byron is, there's still this whole big world going on in the background. I couldn't get enough of it.

I did feel, however, that it wasn't as emotionally satisfying as it could've been. As engaged as I was, I still didn't become emotionally involved. I also felt that the ending was a little off; despite the frenetic pace, it almost felt anticlimactic after everything that had come before.

Overall, though, this was a great read. I had a lot of fun with it, and I'd certainly recommend it.

(A slightly different version of this review originally appeared on my blog, Stella Matutina). ( )

The story in this book follows the famed nineteenth-century poet, Lord Byron’s life as a vampire. Byron tells his story to an unsuspecting Rebecca Carville, revealing details from the past and, soon enough, a surprise about the present.

This was one of my favorite books as a teen. I loved it so much that I bought a second copy, hoping to find someone to share it with.

In my opinion, this book is even better than Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire, one of the most acclaimed books in the same genre. And, after reading this book, research on the life of Lord Byron might make you wonder. ( )

This story sounded like a good idea, but it starts out so interminably slow that I was forced to put it down after the first couple of chapters. ( )

One of two very cleverly done vampire books. Two of my favorites actually. He manages to combine some notable people and fictional characters in history in a totally believable way and also creates more of a place for John Polidori than he usually manages to have. It was well done, richly textured and I might have to read one again today now that I am talking about it. :) ( )

Rebecca Carville gains access to the mysterious Ruthven family vault in search of the lost memoirs of Lord Byron. What she discovers in that vault puts her life in danger while revealing a shocking and terrible secret about Byron, his contemporaries and the Ruthven family.

When I first started reading this I thought it was similar to The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova but it does hae it's differences, not least that The Historian is the better book. Holland told a good tale and obviously enjoyed himself with his oversexed, bisexual vampires. I have to say that some bits made me think of the awful Twilight series in the way he focuses on the 'true love might murder you but you love them anyway' bits.

I was surprised to find that this was a rerelease, first published in Britain in 1995 but I am not sure why as it doesn't read as a recently written book either.

It was an okay book, I read it quickly and it passed the time but I can't think what the point of it was really. I might reread it and I might give it away. It could have been a lot more exciting, or horrifying, or historical, or nerve-jangling, or something. I'm sure the author was aiming for one of those but what he got was okay. ( )