Joe Vampire by Steven Luna will either totally tickle your fancy or flop. Here’s a bit from the Goodreads blurb:
Hey, folks. I’m Joe, and I’m a vampire – not by choice, mind you, but by accident…a fate-twisting, fang-creating, blood lust-inducing misunderstanding. It started with a group date, a case of mistaken identity and far too many sake bombers, and ended with a ridiculous set of circumstances that I just can’t seem to wrap my head around.
Maybe you can tell: I’m not real happy about it. But I’m certainly not going to let it get in the way of my life.
Now, I really thought I was going to enjoy this vampire story so much because the premise of it just sounded so backward and awkward and different. Just how like like things to be. And in all fairness, the writing was good. The idea was good and what little explosive did happen was just all right. I didn’t even mind the structure of the book being presented as Joe Vampire’s blog. Perfectly readable. And no, Joe was not a happy puppy to be a vampire. There wasn’t many things, in fact, that Joe could muster happiness for. We’re dealing with a beaten down, pessimistic, moaning Joe Vampire.
I was a bit disappointed that something more exiting did not happen. It was a regular story of a guy going through life dealing with shit. To be honest- he came across like a real pussy. I swear, if he was my friend I would constantly keep telling him to cop on and get on with it. Yet, the occasional really funny lines kept me reading. It’s a book written by a guy and you can just get that guy-style right away. I mean, transition to vampirism through a nuclear diahrrea? Yup, it’s so totally a guy thing to have the need to draw parrallels with taking a dump. Guys love to talk about shit. The rest of the sense of humor in the book was quite OK, too. Some people love that kind of sarcasm and guy-sass. For me, it loses the awesomeness in heavy doses.
In this book, the vampire is just like any human really but with a strange diet. They suffer from the feels, they still have to work to make money, they still look for love. And they don’t sparkle. To be honest, that “I’m a vampire but not the sparkling kind” is becoming a bit of a cliché. Yeah, yeah, Twlight was a big hit with a sparkling vampire and you don’t sparkle because you’re the real deal and you just need to get a dig in at Twilight. Whatever, get over it. The vampires in this book don’t seem to be struggling with overpowering need for human blood and don’t seem to ponder too much about the fact that they’re going to live for a very very long time. The issues and dramas are quite “in this moment”, quite normal human first world problems. Maybe that’s why it read slightly average. No really dramatic, strange, paranormal incidents. Well, there is a kidnapping, but …
Ah, and I can’t write this review and not mention my favorite character- Bo. A southerner, just a bit thick but harmless and hard worker. He was my favorite character of the whole book and I wish he would have appeared a bit more often. In fact, I wish this book was about Bo, with Bo as the main character.
Overall- it was an OK read. You need to try it out to test the level of humor- it might just be your cup of tea.
My Rating- 2** (It was OK)
Cover to Cover 