Memnoch the Devil (Vampire Chronicles, No 5)
Average Rating: 3.5 Stars
by Anne Rice
List Price: $7.99
Store Price: from $3.80
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Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0345409671
Amazon.com Review
The fifth volume of Rice's Vampire Chronicles is one of her most controversial books. The tale begins in New York, where Lestat, the coolest of Rice's vampire heroes, is stalking a big-time cocaine dealer and religious-art smuggler--this guy should get it in the neck. Lestat is also growing fascinated with the dealer's lovely daughter, a TV evangelist who's not a fraud.
Lestat is also being stalked himself, by some shadowy guy who turns out to be Memnoch, the devil, who spirits him away. From here on, the book might have been called Interview with the Devil (by a Vampire). It's a rousing story interrupted by a long debate with the devil. Memnoch isn't the devil as ordinarily conceived: he got the boot from God because he objected to God's heartless indifference to human misery. Memnoch takes Lestat to heaven, hell, and throughout history.
Some readers are appalled by the scene in which Lestat sinks his fangs into the throat of Christ on the cross, but the scene is not a mere shock tactic: Jesus is giving Lestat a bloody taste in order to win him over to God's side, and Rice is dead serious about the battle for his soul. Rice is really doing what she did as a devout young Catholic girl asked to imagine in detail what Christ's suffering felt like--it's just that her imagination ran away with her.
If you like straight-ahead fanged adventure, you'll likely enjoy the first third; if you like Job-like arguments with God, you'll prefer the Memnoch chapters. --Tim Appelo
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Product Description
"STARTLING . . . FIENDISH . . . MEMNOCH'S TALE IS COMPELLING."
--New York Daily News
"Like Interview with the Vampire, Memnoch has a half-maddened, fever-pitch intensity. . . . Narrated by Rice's most cherished character, the vampire Lestat, Memnoch tells a tale as old as Scripture's legends and as modern as today's religious strife."
--Rolling Stone
"SENSUAL . . . BOLD, FAST-PACED."
--USA Today
"Rice has penned an ambitious close to this long-running series. . . . Fans will no doubt devour this."
--The Washington Post Book World
"MEMNOCH THE DEVIL OFFERS PASSAGES OF POETIC BRILLIANCE."
--Playboy
"[MEMNOCH] is one of Rice's most intriguing and sympathetic characters to date. . . . Rice ups the ante, taking Lestat where few writers have ventured: into heaven and hell itself. She carries it off in top form."
--The Seattle Times
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Customer Reviews
This is brilliant story telling at its best.
5 Stars
This is pure genius and the first book I've liked since Interview. God, the devil, vampires, human evolution and angels all rolled into one fascinating tale. What does LeStat believe in the end and what do you believe he saw in the end? It's woven together nicely and I don't understand why anyone would give this less than 4 stars. It is brilliant story telling and it questions religion in ways we should all question, without insulting religion. Is religion inherently evil or do evil and misguided people make religion evil? Do people create religion or does God inspire us to understand Him? Fascinating piece of work.
~ Jaga,
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great book
5 Stars
Anne Rice is an amazing author. She is so gifted. I've gone through all of the vampire chronicles, this is one of my favorites.
~ R. Delaney, Virginia
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A Reality Unlike Anything I Have Ever Read Before
4 Stars
In the dark futile recesses of my once lurid imagination there existed a place close to what Memnoch would describe as hell. I was fascinated by this character and the world he hid so easily in. This book gives a strong presentation of what I always enjoyed about Anne Rice's novels. It envelopes the reader into the shadows of soggy street corners and mysterious silhouettes only to reveal a hidden underworld that makes even vampires cringe. Are we being inducted into an alternate theology or introduced to a feeling that can only be visited by our souls? That is up to the reader to decide. Either way, it was one of the few stories that truly pulled me from this reality and into another that appeared unlike anything I have ever read before.
~ Alex Hutchinson, Carver, MA
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