A review by zenithharpink
Blood And Gold by Anne Rice

3.0

I wasn't looking forward to this book, and it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. That being said, it was largely a redundant narrative to previous books in the series, and further bloated by sporadic history lessons. In short, this book could have been 200 pages (instead of nearly 600).

This could have been read instead all other books except the first, especially if you find the philosophical tediousness of previous books boring. This book was more plot and action based than previous books, and I enjoyed it more than others.

My real struggle with these books is that I. DON'T. GET. IT. It's like reading a book about people in a totally foreign culture, or at least a warped glass. The decisions these characters make with the available informations makes no sense to me. I constantly feel like I'm missing context or I misread previous elements of the story-and it's an exhausting way to spend 600 pages of your life. That is the core of the tediousness of these novels for me. I love the vampire lore, and I respect the place that these books hold in the canon, but damn it's an annoying read to me with very few rewards.

I continue to come back to these books because I'm a glutton for punishment, and at this point I'm committed to finish what I've started, but the stories really are compelling. I feel like the wiki page version of these books are more interesting than the full content themselves, as the immense time spent on philosophy, psychology, and general analysis SIGNIFICANTLY slow down the pacing of most of these books.

I recommend this book to fans of the series. It's a little different than previous books (except perhaps the first), but to others I'm not sure if I can strongly recommend these or not.