Kill the Dead

This novel is rather different to a lot of this author's work - and I enjoyed it more than most of those I have re-read in the past year. It is a straightforward linear story (with only a few short flash backs into one character's past) and reads without Lee's usual lush baroque prose style, sadistic and machismo heroes, or masochistic female characters. The sex is lowkey and consensual without the creepiness that mars other books: there are no characters, especially women, who enjoy being abused and that is a nice change. The tone is lighter-hearted also, despite the hero's vocation of ghost-killer, and there is even a little humour here and there.

This could be due to the two main characters being based on Kerr Avon and Vila Restal of show more the BBC TV series, Blake's 7, for which Lee wrote a couple of episodes. There are some changes - the Vila character, Myal, is quite a bit younger than Parl Dro (whose name is based on Paul Darrow, the actor who played Avon) and Avon's bitterly ironic one liners are not quite captured. But there are enough similarities, with Myal as a thief, who is prone to stupid impulses, which Lee does develop a backstory to explain. He is also a genius musician, as he became in one of the episodes she wrote. The physical appearance of both men is similar to the TV actors, and it was fun to picture them as such while reading. The story was interesting, held my interest, was well constructed and had a great twist at the end. So despite Dro slightly lacking the flashes of devastating wit that Avon delivered in the series, I am awarding this novel 5 stars. show less

If you do a bit of a mental squint and use your imagination to smooth out the rough edges, this is a pretty good story. To put it in movie terms: it’s like LadyHawke meets The Sixth Sense.

Parl Dro is a handsome ghost killer - he releases the undead who are clinging to the living and sends them to their final destination. Everything changes when Parl stops in a little town to deal with a pair of sisters, Cilny and Ciddey, one dead and one living. There his destiny is joined to the roguish pick-pocketing troubadour Myal, and together they journey to Ghyste Mortua, the ghost city in the mountains.

Like all the other Lee books I have read, it is full of psychic power, supernatural sensuality, thwarted love, sadness and regrets.

A ghost killer limps into town and exorcises the ghost of a girl, against the wishes of the girl's sister. The sister then kills herself and becomes deadalive in order to exact vengance against Parl Dro. Dro's steps are dogged by a minstrel who refuses to leave him alone, and all three of them follow the road to a whole town that died in a single landslide and who's ghosts terrorise the surrounding area. The interconnections between all the characters gets pretty complex, and the plot twists and turns around, driven by revenge and something like love. Beautifully written, as expected, but I'm not sure I followed all the twists.

Parl Dro is a killer of the dead--he releases the spirits of ghosts who refuse to depart the living. And one woman is not happy when he does so to her sister. She then dogs his steps, and a minstrel dogs her steps as Dro makes his way to a ghost city. Not a horror book in the scary, creepy sense and this is among Tanith Lee's more comedic books, laden with plenty of humor and wit--and with her sensuous, lyrical prose. A short book that reads quickly you could down in one sitting--and with a neat twist.

“Pico review” written for the SF fanzine OtherRealms (SF review zine by Chuq Von Rospach, Dec. 1989): Blake's Seven meets Vampire Hunter "D". I searched for years for a copy of this book and paid dearly when I found a used copy, but it was most worth it. Parl Dro is a Ghost-Killer, seeking the deadalive that cling to and prey upon the living. If he can destroy a ghost's link with this world it will be forced to travel on to the next. Traveling with him, sort of, is Myal Lemyal, minstral and thief. They are both heading toward Ghyste Mortua, the ghost-filled city of the dead, Parl to destroy it and Myal to make a song about it. Haunting their journey is Ciddey Soban - newly deadalive and linked, somehow, to Myal. Lee wrote this after show more scripting two episodes of Blake's Seven, because she liked the characters and the actors. The dialog between Parl and Myal could easily be for Avon and Vila (Myal - "I wish I was dead". . . Parl - "I wish you were, too"). show less

no bc my relationship w tanith lee has gotten sooooo parasocial im convinced this book was written for me and me alone