Tag: Bullets

99 Coffins

Random Thoughts

Having previously enjoyed David Wellington’s Monster Trilogy, and the first of his vampire books, 13 Bullets, I was eager to pick up his second vampire tale, 99 Coffins, when I managed to find one on the shelf.

Let me take an aside here and laud some praise on Borders Bookstores.  Traditionally, I’m a Barnes & Noble guy, or even a patron of Book-A-Million.  Their prices always seem to be better.  Or when something is hard to find and if I can manage free shipping, Amazon is my go to site of choice.  However, when it comes to picking up Horror books, Borders really does jump above other brick and mortar book retailers simply because they have a Horror section.  See, when you go look for Horror in most stores you have to hunt for them.  Stephen King and Dean Koontz, because they are well known, you’ll find in the Fiction section along side Tom Clancy and other novelists.  But a lesser known author is more likely to be found in the Science Fiction and Fantasy section.  It makes see what is new in Horror a difficult task.  Not so at Borders.  Walk right in and wedged between the Sci-Fi/Fantasy books and the Romance, you’ll find the Horror in a little 4 or 8 foot section all its own, and organized just like every other section… hardcovers and trades and new releases at the top with shelves of paperbacks below.  Heaven.

Anyway… 99 Coffins picks up pretty much where 13 Bullets left off.  Our intrepid vampire hunter, not feeling so spritely after the last book, calls on our heroine again.  This time, it seems so fellows digging around in Gettysburg uncovered a crypt of sorts, and inside are 99 coffins containing 99 vampire skeletons missing all 99 hearts.  But there is evidence… there might have been a 100th coffins.  Vampires are afoot at America’s Historic playground.

Of course, I love the book.  As good as the first, perhaps even a tad better.  Honestly, I was worried.  After the downward turn that Wellington’s second Monster book took in quality, I thought maybe he just might have problems with the middle acts of his trilogies, but 99 Coffins turned out quite well.

Now I just need to wait for the third book, Vampire Zero, just four short days after my birthday.  The anticipation may just do me in…

13 Bullets

Reviews

I had previously read a trilogy by David Wellington, and the short version of that review is the first book was fantastic, the second was lacking, and the third was better but not as good as the first.  However, despite the fact that I wasn’t thrilled with the second and third books, the first one was so good that I have been itching to pick up more of his stuff.  I finally did.

13 Bullets is a story about vampires.  In the world he crafts, vampires exist and everyone knows about them, but vampires are extremely rare so people often forget that they exist or at least deny to themselves that they are really real.  These are not your Anne Rice vampires, these are vicious monsters who thirst for blood.  In fact, the more they eat, the more they crave, so a smart vampire might be able to hide for a while, but eventually his thirst will lead to large enough slaughters that he can no longer go unnoticed.  These vampires don’t have two fangs, they have a set of jaws like a shark with rows of sharp teeth.

But specifically, the story is about Laura Caxton, a State Trooper in Pennsylvania who stumbles on to vampires and gets mixed up in the horror along with a U.S. Marshall who has been hunting vampires for twenty years.

Wellington’s writing in 13 Bullets is as strong as Monster Island.  I devoured the book, and am hoping that the sequel, 99 Coffins, doesn’t fall like Monster Nation did.  Definitely, though, 13 Bullets is a damn fine read, especially if you like horror.