Recently Read: Prime

[ellyssian]

Prime: A Novel - Poppy Z. Brite

I can think back to countless examples where a band would release a new album, and, having attempted something different, the fans become devided. Add a new singer or drummer in to the mix, and the sound changes, and what was old is new again. Even in genres that practically require innovation, this can prove a stumbling block for fans. Critics, meanwhile, always have a choice of options: they can pan a band for doing something different, or they can pan a band for sounding the same as they did last album. A lose-lose situation.

docbrite has received a lot of flak for leaving behind the world of vampires and blood sucking beasts and goth kids, especially from that latter segment, who want her to write another Drawing Blood or Lost Souls. Those books are great - I quickly devoured every single one of her books I could get my hands on. While I certainly enjoyed the sense of horror she built into the stories, more than vampires and vamping goths, I enjoyed her writing itself.

I don't want to say Prime is the same - it's not in so many ways - but there is still an undeniable voice, and, I believe, I would have been able to identify the author from nearly any snippet. There is something about her writing itself that I like. A recent discussion on prime_liquor was based on how some readers would like to hear about all the minute, mundane details she cut to build a good story. I'm sure I'd have to count myself in that camp - although at the same time I don't begrudge her for removing those pieces. I have a feeling Doc could write an instruction manual and I would simply have to read it, and in as few sittings as possible...

I'm sure that it doesn't hurt that her current subject matter - of chefs and the restaurant business - is of particular interest to me, with my backburnered dreams of starting my own restaurant. This book is much more palatable on a full stomach - or at a time and in proximity to the means to come to that state.

I tend to pick things up quick, and having been a member of the prime_liquor community for a few months, I have picked up bits and pieces as to what happens in these two books (and, to some minor degree, in the forthcoming books as well.) That said, I still managed to completely and quite obviously select the second book first, leaving Liquor: A Novel still on the shelf... a situation I will have to rectify as soon as I can. Although I made it through alive - and quite enjoyed the experience - I would probably advise reading the first book, well, first. It will help you not know things that are, I am sure, revealled deliberately at a certain point in Liquor. Even with the spoiler effect, I expect to thoroughly enjoy that book as well.

Oh, and one final note for those die-hard fans of Doc's early stuff: there are still plenty of blood suckers - they just don't have pointy teeth and drink blood, but they are lawyers, so that is - to me - even more horrifying!

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Or when I get my vampire fiction published, they can all enjoy my twisted view of the vampire scene.