13 Bullets

13 Bullets by David Wellington

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I suppose that a novel by an author who’s written three zombie novels, a vampire novel, and is currently working on a werewolf novel, shouldn’t surprise me with its violence.  But it does.  It starts out brutal, continues being brutal, and ends in brutality.  It’s pretty harsh, and was a bit surprising to me.  I don’t know why this surprised me like it did; Monster Island was pretty violent, too, but I don’t recall it being this graphic and intense.  And hell, I enjoy Charlie Huston, too, whose scenes make most of the ones in this book seem tame by comparison.  So who knows?  Maybe I just wasn’t in the right frame of mind for that sort of scene when I read the book.

As far as vampire novels go, though, this one shies away from the “Romantic tortured soul” that has been so popular lately, and goes back to making them monsters.  It works, and is even a bit refreshing in places.  The central character is a female state trooper who becomes involved with tracking down the last few vampires in existence.  What makes this book more interesting than most vampire novels is that, in this world, the general public knows about the monsters.  It’s thought that they have been extinct since the 1980s, but once the police start bandying about the word “vampire,” there’s little disbelief from the other characters.  I can’t recall other novels being that forward with their portrayal of the creatures, so I enjoyed that aspect of the book.

Another aspect I liked was the pacing, and the plot.  Wellington has developed his style over the past few books, and the story is less choppy and uneven as Monster Island was.  That’s good to see, as well as how he tightened the plot in this novel.  There aren’t too many coincidences that make you question anyone’s place in the story, and aside from a tough state trooper occasionally acting like a typical female character in a horror movie (screaming and panicking under stress),the motivations make a lot of sense.  All in all, the novel holds together very well.

I wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone unless they were hardcore horror/vampire buffs, due to the nature of the story.  It’s graphic and violent, almost just to be so, and it takes a tough disposition to stomach some of the scenes.  If this sounds like your thing, then you likely won’t be disappointed with 13 Bullets.

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