Live Girls

This might be the first novel I’ve ever read that actually lived up to all the hype the blurbs on the front and back cover built up for it. You’re doing pretty well for yourself if you’ve got Dean Koontz and Stephen King giving you the rub on your own book sleeve, but their quips are not just cheap hyperbole. Live Girls is a damn fine horror story, and probably an even better vampire story. This is a twisted, disturbing, and ultimately postmodern take on the fanged fiends, with a healthy dose of dark erotica thrown into the cocktail for good measure.

The setting is a wintry, slate gray New York City, sometime in the late 80’s. Davey Owen, an editor by trade, wanders through the cold perma-rain of the city streets, finding himself show more in the gaudy neon gestalt of Times Square. He’s lost his girl and then his job, but bad things always come in threes, don’t they? When he decides to ‘live a little’ and head into one of the sex joints at random, things will get much, much worse for poor Davey. He chooses a club called 'Live Girls', which seems a little more discreet than the others along the street. Inside, he encounters Anya, a stripper who allows Davey to get a little bit 'interactive' with the private show.

Guys, just think of the worst possible location a female vampire could drain blood from you, okay? Ray Garton goes there.

Our other main protagonist is Walter Benedek, veteran journalist for the New York Times (thankfully he’s not a complete liberal pussy… Oh, come on! I couldn’t resist!) and a straight-laced skeptic when it comes to all things supernatural. As the story unfolds, that skepticism quickly erodes, as Walter forms something of a friendship with Davey and the two are plunged into the vampiric underworld. Garton gets this part just right, as our protagonists start out with what we think is a mundane murder mystery, only to slowly unravel a world of violence and decadence that has apparently existed under the nose of humanity for an untold number of generations. This is part of what makes the novel a truly superb horror tale; the reader is under the illusion that everything is safe and calm, when suddenly all hell breaks loose, and there’s no going back after that.

Garton proves he can write for both ends of the spectrum, first with a number of brief, but still completely chilling sections of unadulterated, gruesome horror. If you thought his ‘normal’ vampires were bad, wait until you discover what’s living in the basement of 'Live Girls'. I couldn’t contain the gleeful feelings I experienced at the author’s horrific and grotesque creations, I was giggling like a madman. At the same time, there’s the erotica - at least half a dozen sexual encounters between the various characters throughout the novel. While I rarely applaud an author sexing a book up, especially male authors (because their scenes are either too flowery or too clinical or just downright embarrassing, and they’re usually doing it just for shock value), Garton appears to have a keen mind when it comes to penning highly sensual lovemaking while still capturing the visceral and animalistic qualities of doing the naughty.

What I really like here is how the author turns a great number of formerly commonplace myths about the vampire and turns them on their head. Sure, it’s been done to death nowadays (so much so that the rumors for an updated Dracula film indicate it’s going to be a hard adaption of the novel), but in ‘87, some of these ideas were fresh. Vampires don’t burst into flame if they’re caught in sunlight (although bright lights do seem to bug them a bit), they’re not warded off by holy symbols, they don’t need to be invited into a home before entering. The only typical piece of vampire lore that makes it into this novel is their aversion to garlic, which is explained away as an allergy. Indeed, Garton brings the legendary undead creatures into the contemporary by elucidating a number of the formerly muddy areas about their existence in scientific terms.

The ending is very satisfying, despite the fact that a number of loose ends still remain. It would take Garton damn near 18 years to get around to writing a sequel to Live Girls, entitled Night Life (which will shortly be on my 'to-read' list). I would say that if you’re yearning for a decent horror in an age when they’re in perilously short supply, Live Girls is one to look out for. show less

This was an extremely fun and exciting book to read. The story gets moving pretty early on and doesn't let up. This is one of those books where you don't want to put it down and before you know it, a couple hours are past and you are almost finished.

Davey Owen is having a hard Monday. After his girlfriend leaves him and work treats him as crap, he steps outside to get some fresh air. Before he knows it, Davey is enticed to visit a peep show labeled as Live Girls. And thus starts a new level of having a hard day as Davey finds himself sucked into a world of vampires.

Yeah, if you try explaining the book as "vampire strippers", it sounds really corny. But the story is very well thought out and mature. The characters are interesting, flawed show more and engaging. And it is a nice modern twist on the vampire mythos. You might think that you've had enough of vampires but you should give this a try. You'll like it. show less

I hope I don't offend anyone with this review, but here it goes.
Let me start by saying, I loved this book, and I am going to read the sequel for sure.
Now to get down to the nitty gritty: This is my version of a trashy sleazy beachy speed read book.
I could have read this in one gulp while laying out in the sun, or perhaps on an airplane.
Instead I powered through it in 2 nights, last night being wide awake at 2am blatantly refusing to put it down.
Its a story! Plain and simple and down to the guts, it is an easy breezy BAD romance novel with GORE instead of glitter. There is no stylistic writing that hurts your brain to decipher, no metaphors or anything to hurt your brain meats.
So, when I say trashy and sleazy, I mean there are some show more raunchy porn scenes that are pretty intense and bound to make you uncomfortable in public. I sometimes need a reprieve from the heavy stuff I normally need. And this was pure unalderated Fun, with a capital F.
I enjoyed it, and that being said: it is not for everyone.
I am basically a reformed sewer rat. I do have supreme taste in literature, BUT I still can't help running straight back down to the sewer sometimes. I need my fix.
This is identical to those 2-3am Taco Bell trips after a long night of drinking and dancing. Disgusting, but at the time: it is pure EXTACY. show less

After reading “Paperbacks from Hell”, I found some of them were in eBook format. Some of those story concepts sounded too intriguing not to pick up. This book was written about modern vampires in New York. Yes, I know I just said I don’t like vampires, but this has to do with strippers and peep shows and the seedy NYC setting of the eighties.

It’s classic horror pulp, full of terror, horror, and gross-out. The kind of stuff Stephen King started out with. And I loved reading about classic New York when Times Square was full of peepshows and bums, not immigrants in Elmo costumes. The problem is you can’t talk about vampires in modern times. Too many advancements negate their existence–blood banks, constant surveillance, show more forensics. And to be brutal, their kills have to be sloppy. Detecting a vampire would be as easy as finding a superhero’s secret identity. They would have to organize like mob, which they kinda do in this book.

I got what I expected–a pulpy horror novel about vampires. The problem is, vampires aren’t scary to me. They’re monsters, but monsters with too many weaknesses. So steer clear if you have no interest in them. show less

This is a book that's stuck in the back of my mind for almost thirty years. I remember being intrigued by a review in Twilight Zone Magazine back in the day, but I never did find a copy until now.* One of those holy grail books. The book was considered pretty extreme for its time, but realizing that things have gone much further since then (and also that my interests and tastes weren't quite the same as when I was a teenager) I kept my expectations low, and I enjoyed the book. It's about a man who, after losing his live-in girlfriend, decides to visit a strip club and gets a little more than he expected. The book chronicles Danny's gradual descent into vampirism and also a reporter's quest for the truth about his sister's murder. You show more can guess that these two things are related.

*Leisure Books reprinted it many years later but it had a hideous cover and I refused to purchase it. show less

OMG... This took me back to something I would have read when I was fifteen or so. Not that this is a young adult book by any means...I just read a lot of things that I maybe shouldn't have. I really enjoyed this. Vampires own a strip club and a more exclusive club and find their victims through these means. Vicious and sexy. Reads like a horror movie.

A classic. Garton is a pretty good writer in any case, but in this book he's at the height of his powers. Not the kind of thing you would want to leave lying around the house and have the children pick up though....