"Bite Me" is a blood-sucking, foul-mouthed, tushy-puckering plunge into the depths of contemporary, urban vampire literature. You've gotta read it.
Indeed, if you are inclined to barf at the overindulgence of lovelorn vampire sagas that have middle-aged readers forsaking their marriages in search of "a love like Bella and Edward's," you will adore this death-defying trip through the hilarious degeneracy and high-falutin' wordplay of Christopher Moore's third book in his San Francisco "vampyre" series.
(Moore has a book-signing for "Bite Me" March 10 at Mysterious Galaxy Books in Clairemont Mesa.)
"Bite Me" continues the raunchy, rollicking storyline launched by "Bloodsucking Fiends" in 1995 and revisited in "You Suck" in 2007. And if you haven't read the first two novels, not to worry. Moore's protagonist, an edgy, horny teenage "goth girl," Abby Normal, spews a recap of the previous action in the new novel's opening chapter.
Said recap is luridly interspersed with various rants: about her "mother unit" who cursed her with "small-boobed DNA"; about her "deeply gay" BFF Jared ---- "he dresses in dismal chic and excels at brooding, self-loathing and allergies to beauty products"; about yearning to be "turned" so she can possess her own vampyric dark powers; and about her steamy, forbidden love for Foo Dog, her "manga-haired love monkey" who "almost has his master's in bio-nerdism."
All of this Abby is blogging in her spiky, Romantic-poet-paraphrasing spin on hip-hop talk, which jars the reader back to her whacked-out but endearing perspective every few chapters.
While Abby tries to fake out the mother unit by popping home twice a week in a pretense of teen normalcy, she remains ensconced in the love lair she established in hopeful servitude to Countess Jody and Dark Lord Flood, the vampyre "It" couple of the previous books. Unlike Dracula's Renfield, however, Abby refuses to become a sycophantic bug-eating minion ----- instead assuming the role of public servant to the city of San Francisco, which is about to face a plague of bad vampyre juju, which sets the performance-art stage for Book Three.
Moore, like other vampire raconteurs, has his own rules of thumb for the bloodletting set that help shape his story. Amid his comfortably complex plot and his stinky, skanky and sexy, evil, eccentric and endearing characters, "Bite Me" is infused with a huge honking helping of satirical commentary.
The first chapter's title, "Hello Kitty," is not a nod to the pink merchandise that has saturated the pre-pubescent female marketplace. No, Moore's "kitty" is Chet, the erstwhile, dine-at-home blood source for Countess Jody and Lord Flood. Chet is turned into a huge, shaved vampyre cat that becomes increasing deadly with each creature he and his growing caterwaul of cats suck dry, leaving distasteful heaps of greasy, ashy, chunky stuff, reminiscent of kitty litter.
Besides artfully blood-splattered characters and hilarious commentary, Moore has a gift for description and metaphor, most of which is a bit too colorful to publish in a newspaper. Some of the tamer examples:
The stoner, vampyre-chasing night crew from Safeway is helping cook up a batch of vampyre cat-killing soup: "Foul and magical fumes bubbled out of the kettle, like the flatulence of dragons on a demon-only diet." And when Abby thinks Foo Dog has rejected her for a car, she mourns: "So it’s like, Oh noez! And an inky-colored despair of rejection enveloped me like the black tortilla of repression around a pain burrito."
Dragon farts and desperate burritos, you don’t read that every day, to paraphrase the Emperor, a homeless, beloved but nonetheless "raving loon," who has his finger on the pulse ---- or lack thereof ---- of the city.
Perhaps most distinctive in Moore’s writing is his pervasive sense of humor. The reader can't wallow in gnawing anticipation of what hellish fate might befall a character next, because Moore is whopping you upside the head with comedy, highbrow and low. One of his running comedic themes in "Bite Me" takes dog lovers to task for failing to comprehend their canine companions' vocal emanations.
Bummer, a homeless, vampyre-hunting dog, tries to alert the Emperor to some lurking cats: "'Cat! Cat! Cat! Cat!' barked Bummer. ... 'Cat! Murder, pain, fire, evil, cat! Can’t you smell them? Everywhere! Must chase, chase, chase, bite, bite, bite, let me go you insane, oblivious old man, I'm trying to save you, for the love of God, CAT! CAT! CAT!" Unfortunately, Bummer only spoke dog, and while the Emperor could tell that the Boston terrier was upset, he had no idea why."
Meanwhile, the Emperor's other dog, a golden retriever, joins in: "'He's right about the cat,' Lazarus ruffed, nudging the Emperor's leg. 'We should get out of this neighborhood, maybe go over to North Beach and see if anyone dropped a beef jerky or something. I could sure use a beef jerky. Or we can stay and die. Whatever. I'm good with it.'" How accommodating, just like his breed.
It is juxtapositions such as the mundane canine wish for a bit of salted beef with the howling search for blood-sucking things that make "Bite Me" so ridiculously, rabidly fun to consume. Put aside any anti-vampire sentiments and take a bite. It is a sanguine delight.
Kit-Bacon Gressitt is a writer, editor and host of Fallbrook's monthly Writers Read. E-mail her at kbgressitt@aol.com.
"Bite Me"
**** (out of four)
Author: Christopher Moore
Publisher: William Morrow 2010
Binding: Hardcover and e-book
Pages: 309
Price: $23.99
