"Cirque du Freak # 1: A Living Nightmare" by Darren Shan

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Read: 3/16/09

3/5 stars

I'm into vampire literature, so i didn't want to pass up a chance to read Darren Shan. After all, it's geared for young adults, like Twilight, though I heard a bit darker.

I'm not sure if I agree with the darker part. The protagonist, coincidentally (wink) named after Darren Shan, goes with his best friend to watch an underground freak show, and, due to circumstances that only a teenager with an overactive imagination will get into, ends up having to apprentice himself to a real vampire who works in the freak show.

Why don't I think that this is especially dark? Because the vampire himself says that vampires are not really evil creatures. They even shun making vampires out of people who have "bad" blood--people who have it in them to be killers. Also, to transform one into a vampire, one just has to do it through the fingers. The vampire pricks the fingers of the victim with his nails, pricks his own fingers, the two hold their fingers together (a la E.T. but think all 10 fingers), and their blood gets mixed, hence turning the human into a vampire, though not a full one right away. All this, obviously to cater to young adults. But, where's the blood? Where's the gore? Where's the devilish creature? Unfortunately, the book did not live up to the comparison to Salem's Lot of Stephen King, and I guess the false expectation is built up here.

So, I'm not sure if I want to continue with the series, as the character does not recommend himself to me either. Not much is shown about Master Shan--only that he's a young boy who's into spiders. I wished for more character depth, but even his actions were explained no further than something to the effect of: "I just had to." The only part that I thought had some depth was the ending where he had to fake his own death and observe his own family's grief. That, to me, was compelling.

In the end, I would still recommend it to young teenager, but this is one vampire series that I'm personally lukewarm to.

Comments

sumthinblue said…
Honey, it gets darker, I promise -- the first book is literally a twelfth of the whole story.

And, hehe, the 12th book explains why the character is also named Darren Shan :)
March 20, 2009 at 9:28 AM
fantaghiro23 said…
Ok. Will try to read books 2 and 3 before the movie comes out.
March 20, 2009 at 5:31 PM
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