Official Review: The Vampire Revelation: Demon Gene

[CatGitane]

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "The Vampire Revelation: Demon Gene" by Sam Stafford.]

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I jumped on the chance to read Sam Stafford’s novel The Vampire Revelation: Demon Gene as I adore vampire books, and I mean, real vampire books. The ones where it’s all bloody, with a good intrigue and cruel characters. The novels I used to search for hours in many different libraries because it was so rare. And let me tell you, I wasn’t disappointed with his story! In fact, it’s become one of my favorites, and I’m quite a hard critique.

This is an amazing story. It is highly thrilling, intense, captivating, and if I keep going on like this I’ll lack positive adjectives! It immerses you without any difficulty, and thank God for a faithful vampire story; they’re cruel and bloody like supposed to. Thanks to Stafford’s novel, hope visited me again about this field and it pushes me hard to write one of mine – I thought real vampires were extinct, but he proved me wrong and I could not stop being grateful for his resurrecting them. It was time someone did it! The cover is interesting, full of haemoglobins that represent the theme well, and it’s visually pleasant and weirdly calming. The chapters are made of very good lengths; there are many (56), but they’re satisfying and allow the punchlines to work well. The end of his chapters always end in foreshadowing or big twists right before switching to another point of view, which is really frustrating but a great way to go about it – I had never seen this peculiar style and rather enjoyed it. The transitions are natural and believable, making them engaging. Also, the different point of views keep things diverse, and interesting, which is well-done and gives other insights to the stories and help us get to know each and every character, even the villain! The twists, punchlines, and surprises are both big and small, but all are important and leave you on the edge of your seat, grumbling as it changes point of view and you have to wait chapters to get the answer you want. I love this! It had me absorbed into the story and coming back for more every second I found during the day. The comebacks to them are gripping and don’t leave you unfazed; you dive in as though you hadn’t even changed point of views at all, which is very neat, because you now have even more information to understand this new part. As for the characters, God, they’re strong! They are round and have much dimension, which is totally engrossing and exciting. It only makes you feel them, have the bad luck (haha!) to get too fond and attached to them. You can easily see their differences, their particularities, personalities as though they were real, along with their proper dynamism, and you can’t help but connect with them on a deep level.

Unfortunately, there always has to have bad sides to everything, even if it’s only a few, though one is major. I’ll start with the one that almost ruined it for me (I say almost because the unimaginably great story saved it by sheer interest): the grammar, orthography, and repetitions. Not all verbs are conjugated at the right tense nor written like they should be, words aren’t as supposed (e.g. ‘a gentlemens body’ – two mistakes in one sequence), and repetitions are just so damn annoying I heaved sighs several times and nearly threw the book away out of irritation for at least three times (but I kept coming back to it because of my given word and the story). How does he repeat things? Well, on one sentence he names a character, then after the comma he names him again, same thing on the next sentence, etc. It’s maddening! There should be more pronouns and such. So that’s for the worst (but trust me, I’ve never seen such an infuriatingly written book before, and I’ve read so many). The other points are mainly suggestions to the author, as one in the form of a question: why do your vampires breathe? They’re supposed to be dead! (Then again, I know the answer as I’ve read it, but Mr. Stafford should explain it a bit earlier… slightly so we don’t keep wondering and thinking he’s made a mistake for the rest of the book). Second, the characters didn’t seem that shocked to learn vampires were real. I mean, scientists are usually very narrow-minded towards such things (even though I think Harley was the best one to believe it quickly), and ordinary people are as well, or they would at least freak out. But none acted this way, it was almost smooth. They seemed indifferent… It didn’t ring normal, nor true… Some background explaining or described open-mindedness could be added about it? Perhaps only one or two characters reacting well to the news would have been good? I think so; actually, it would have made it more believable as it broke a bit of the magic for me.

I give it a rating of 3 out of 4 since the story is a real nostalgia ride, marvel-inducer, and entertainer. It made me proud and invigorated that there are still good vampire stories out there and incite me to go out and look for them again. It gave me hope. It’s very good; no, amazing! I suggest you read it if you love vampire stories (with an interesting take on them), even despite all the mistakes. Or if you can bear those.

I urge the author to do a proper editing of his upcoming books as it would make them all the more magnificent and enjoyable to read. Because they’re really worth it (well, this one, at least). I would have given it a 4 out of 4 rating (excellent), if it had not been for so many grammar and orthography inconsistencies along with repetitions. The story itself deserves it. Seriously, what a great story!

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