The Strain

Promise me vampires, and I will follow you pretty much anywhere. To Mormon propaganda masquerading as teen angst in Washington or violent soap operas in Lousiana. To an apocalyptic future or a dense history. To whiny Louis and impulsive Lestat and the many repetitions of their love triangle with poor Claudia. And always, always, back to a Hellmouth in Southern California.

I blame this on being exposed to Spike at a formative age.

The point is that I was predisposed to like this book and am horribly biased in favor of it. The second I heard the Guillermo del Toro was tackling vampires on FX this summer, I got excited. Everything about that combination makes me think I'll like it. And then I found out that it's going to be based on a book (which was written after the initial television pitch failed), and I ran out to get my hands on it.

This story is vampires meets CSI. The initial attack is broken down and studied by a couple of CDC doctors who go to great lengths to understand the biology what appears to be a viral outbreak.

Vampires meeting science is like my Achilles heel. Yes, I want to know how this might actually work in our world. And this book delivers a parasitic nightmare that takes over its host's body and spreads through blood contact. None of these "they drink from you, you drink from them" complications. No slow seduction. This thing spreads fast and begins to resemble a zombie apocalypse by the end of the book.

The book isn't perfect, and there are some valid complaints about it. There are a ton of characters, and you don't spend nearly enough time with many of them. And since there are so many, things can get a little repetitive. Though I thought that was handled well by the authors revealing a bit more information in each new POV.

Ultimately this book was deliciously creepy and paced very well, with the master vampire remaining in the shadows until nearly the end of the book. Things are looking perfectly hopeless as we get ready to start the second book of the trilogy, and the heroes are an interesting bunch of people (though it would be nice to get more than one woman in the group).

That said, I think this story will work better on screen than it did as a novel. If only because del Toro has a knack for creating creatures more terrifying than what I can imagine, and that doesn't translate very well to the written word. Some of the characters might also be forced to show up a little more in a proper 13-episode season of television, which means more time spent with some of my favorites.

This is one of those rare times when I'm going to say that you may not need to read the book. Not everyone is as obsessed with vampires as I am. But if you're at all interested, you should definitely check out the TV show on FX this summer. I'm so excited for it that I can barely contain myself.

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