| Title | : | The Vampire Armand (The Vampire Chronicles, #6) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0345434803 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780345434807 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 457 |
| Publication | : | First published October 10, 1998 |
Now, we go with Armand across the centuries to the Kiev Rus of his boyhood - a ruined city under Mongol dominion - and to ancient Constantinople, where Tartar raiders sell him into slavery. And in a magnificent palazzo in the Venice of the Renaissance we see him emotionally and intellectually in thrall to the great vampire Marius, who masquerades among humankind as a mysterious, reclusive painter and who will bestow upon Armand the gift of vampiric blood. As the novel races to its climax, moving through scenes of luxury and elegance, of ambush, fire, and devil worship to nineteenth-century Paris and today's New Orleans, we see its eternally vulnerable and romantic hero forced to choose between his twilight immortality and the salvation of his immortal soul.
The Vampire Armand (The Vampire Chronicles, #6) Reviews
-
I have no words for how unendurably horrible and boring this book is. Armand knows only how to cry, beg people to love him and seemingly can't get his head around Christ. He is a pathetic wanker that can do nothing on his own, with an unhealthy obsession with Lestat...whom he both loves and hates. He's 17 when turned a vampire, but when he's 500 years old and still 17 in his head, all you want is to strangle him. Apart from that - the narrator being an idiot and a madman - the book lacks plot. Absolutely nothing happens. When alluded to things of interest, Armand/Anne Rice is quick to let the reader know that the matter has already been told in this or that book, and anyway Armand Is Too Jealous Of Lestat to bother recounting it all. The ending is also absolute shit. I had hope until the very end, but...No, Armand is still a whiny wanker that needs to grow a backbone.
-
For all I adore this book and reread it whenever I feel down, underline some thought provoking passages and short phrases Anne Rice uses and admire her writing style for it's uniqueness, I still believe that Anne Rice showed her crazy in the second half of The Vampire Armand.
Armand is the Botticelli angel, as many call him, and he delights in it, I think, purely so Rice can start the book by having him rip a victims scalp off and stomp on it to spite David Talbot, who asks his to stop. He does present a rather interesting character of the Chronicles. He is, perhaps, the personification of Rice's duality in religion. He was a child of Satan at one point, akin to the yezedi muslims who worship a Satan-like figure, knowing that without bad, there is no good, and that Satan tests all and thus works for God. He does horrible things. And yet he believes himself clear of conscience. Armand is quite mad. Becomes so as he ages into the New World. He's very unique character in the series, if not for his age, then his personality.
However the narration dissolves into religious raving at the oddest of times from mid-way on. At some points Armand is pulled from recounting his story to comment on things to David and it is...jarring. At this point Rice had no editors, I think, and it really does show. Half-way through the quality drops considerably and I've found a few spelling errors. Sentences that make no sense and the like.
Over time Rice has become as much of a character of these books as she is the author. It's hard to ignore the religious overtones with Armand, because religion played such a huge role in his life. She's everywhere in the characters and locations. It's like she's sorting out her own philosophical and religious dilemmas through the characters. I don't see the characters, sometimes, I only see her. It makes it hard to relate to the characters, understand their reverence or fear.
I do not recommend this book to those who are new to the series. The Christian influence is thick within the third section of the book, but the first sections of Armand and Marius' formative years in Rome is very much something I adore and would like to think of as dear to me and I hope to others. Theirs is such a strong bond, at that point in time, and it's clear that Anne enjoyed writing it. Her grasp on history and atmosphere is, as always, absolutely wonderful. She describes paintings, rooms, halls, people, with such an interesting way that it doesn't come of as fantasy-type scenery-porn at all. This is the part I love to go back to and reread.
For writers like myself, it's quite soothing to thumb through her pages and try to break down the book. The paragraphs and sentences. I could compare her prose to Stephen Kings, and yet she is somehow a little better paced than he is. Not so drawn out but still descriptive. It may also be the subject matter, but I still would ask if one likes the way Stephen King writes before recommending Rice for all she is, to me, an essential read to those wanting to know about the rise of vampire fiction.
I can read this book again and again, and feel the same heartache for Armand every time. It never gets old. There's an incredible amount of charm to the book despite its brutal nature in parts, and other shortcomings that just really confused me. -
Armand es mi vampiro favorito de las crónicas, y conocer su historia fue asombroso.
Hubo muchas cosas que me gustaron, la forma en que está el orden del libro fue una de ellas, con ls frases en italiano que lo hicieron más adorable.
Me encanta como se plasmaron sus origines desde que fue humano en Rusia y todo lo que lo llevó a conocer a Marius, ese antes y después luego de que la oscuridad llegara a él me fascinó.
Libro imperdible para los amantes de la saga. -
Horrid.
"Egg yoke"? Seriously? She doesn't know the difference between "yoke" and "yolk"?
Armand is in a new room.
She spends an hour describing that room.
Then spends an hour describing the clothes they wear while standing in that room.
Then spends an hour explaining how Armand feels about the clothes they are wearing while standing in that room.
Halfway through the chapter she reminds you why they are in that room.
Which is good because after all that useless filler bullshit I've completely forgotten that Armand and Marius are still playing "cat and mouse" about their attraction to each other as they have been doing throughout the entire first half of the book.
I didn't finish the second half.
Instead I took an hour to describe the room I'm sitting in. Then another hour to describe the clothing I'm wearing while sitting in this room. Then another hour explaining how I feel about these clothes that I wear while sitting in this room... just to remember I stopped reading this horrid book to find something better to do.
Hate this book. -
DNF @ 46%
Either I grew tired of this, or Armand's story didn't really appleal to me. I browsed through it, but I couldn't find the will to finish it. -
I'm completely unable to like this book. I just can't. I only read it because I'm a fan of Anne Rice's Vampires' series. I was never really Armand's fan and this book only made me hate him even more. I even tried to see the story through his and Marius' point of view, but no matter how beautiful may be the story of a mature man trapped in a angel-like boy, the constant and exhaustive repetition of this fact is simply annoying. Armand himself thinks he is too much of an adult, but during the WHOLE BOOK his acts contradict his thoughts. And there are too many things that Armand does that you just can't understand and not even his moments of supposedly "insanity" explain, unlike what happens with Lestat.
The little flashback scenes of the red-haired baby-vampire were only enough to increase my hatred towards this childish character, that did nothing more than cry for his master during more than half of the book (so that he would abandon him for no plausible reason). The only thing that made me want to finish reading this book was nearly the ending, when he finally realizes his own mistakes.
Absolutely awful. I'd even read VIOLIN again, but won't ever want to look at this book ever again. -
Lestat lies in a coma-like sleep in a chapel and while vampires gathers around him, Armand tells his story to David Talbot, Lestat’s former Talamascan fledgling. Armand takes us with him through his childhood in Kiev; from where he is kidnapped and sold to slavery, to Venice where Marius saves him and eventually gives the dark gift and to Paris where he led his Satanic Vampire cult.
Maybe I should start this telling that this was 4th or 5th time reading this and yep, I still love it! Armand’s always been my favourite so it’s no surprise I love this.
It’s been over 8 years since I’ve last read this, and long before I had even heard about blogs etc., so it was interesting to read it again. And it seems my book taste hasn’t changed since I was 15… And oh why it’s so hard to write about books you loved!
When Armand lived in Kiev as a child he painted beautiful icons and was meant to join the monks so he had pretty religious upbringing, which shows through his life and is constant theme through the book.
I’ve always loved the chapter where Marius takes Armand back to Kiev after turning him. He could let the past go little after meeting his family and his father who was such a huge presence in his life.
They didn’t have that many years together with Marius but it was a big part of his life when he was loved and (relatively) safe. And I was dreading to reach the part where it would all be ruined!
It’s been told in previous books that he was the leader of the vampire cult that imprisoned Lestat but now we see how he became part of it.
You can see the growing theme with Christianity on Rice’s books here and while I’m not even remotely religious it didn’t bother me. I love the writing style and the descriptive writing but that may not be to everyone’s liking. -
I am giving this book two stars only because Anne Rice is a talented author, and I can’t bear to give this a single-star rating (though, honestly, it might deserve it).
Man, what a bummer. I loved the last four volumes in this series, but this was a mess. Written after a short hiatus from the Vampire Chronicles, this volume follows Memnoch the Devil, which Rice said was supposed to be the series finale. That would have made sense, and it would have been a fine note to end on. Instead, three years later, this mess hit bookstore shelves.
First off, Lestat is almost nowhere to be found here. I think because, up to this point, the Brat Prince features heavily in all the vampire novels that Rice wasn’t sure where to go with this story. Armand is certainly one of the more interesting immortals — for his age, if nothing else — but he makes for a booooooring narrator. He lacks all the wit and humor of Lestat; he has no personality of his own. What a dud. And don’t get me started on the disjointed ‘feel’ of the story: first half is littered with awkward, heavy-handed sex; second half is . . . I don’t even know, dude. Boring AF. I can’t remember a thing that happened. Maybe that’s for the best.
They can’t all be winners. I will be taking an extended break from this series. -
Was this book objectively that good? Probably not. Did I love Armand being overly dramatic, getting stabbed by his crazy british one-night stand, having a lot (and I mean A LOT) of hot nights in Renaissance brothels and declaring himself a pious saint who lives only for Jesus a few moments later? Yea, I enjoyed that quite a lot. I mean A LOT!
This isn't one of the best books written by Anne Rice. Certainly not. But unfortunately for my sanity and book taste, Armand is one of my all time favourite fictional characters, ever. I already loved him and his manic mood swings since Interview with a Vampire and I even loved him more after finding out about his past and struggles. He possesses a kind of depth that somehow speaks to me. Which of course makes this review an utterly subjective matter. So beware of my lamentations about the long lost Renaissance past. And of me fangirling over some 500 year old dude looking like a Boticcelli angel.
So here we have the life story of Armand, who was born as a poor boy in Kievan Rus and went through a lot of abduction and slavery to become an educated, rich and obnoxiously arrogant venice noble. Followed by a complicated love story between him and Marius, which would make every marriage counsellor a happy person. It's sadly clear that Armand was never the most important person to any of his companions, even though he loved them unconditionally.
However, this makes a good premise for a great character analysis, which this book undouptendly is. Armand is, as all vampires in the Chronicles, an unreliable narrator. The way he sees himself is often contradictory to how other speak of him. By giving us insight into his past, he tries to explain his sometimes irrational and borderline behaviour. Similar to Lestat from the other books he likes to portray himself in a good light, following moral and religious principles. This is a thing I generally like about The Vampire Chronicles. That one has to always question the storyteller and his motives.
The unreliable narrator and the way Anne Rice brings history back to life are the two things that make this series so compelling. I could vividly imagine walking down old streets in Venice in the age of Renaissance while listening to merchants shouting and watching Marius' apprentices causing havoc. Furthermore, I love Renaissance art, which made this book my ultimate guilty pleasure.
If you enjoyed The Vampire Chronicles so far, you will certainly enjoy this one too. It's refreshing to see another POV once in a while, as Lestat is mostly getting all the glory. However, this kind of genre must be your cup of tea. And since Armand is my favourite immortal drama boy in this wide world, give me all the tea you've got. -
This is where I stopped in the series. Anne Rice had the habit of making all her characters extremely homo erotic from the beginning, but I could deal with it because the stories were excellent. I had to draw the line at this book though. Reading about ancient vampires giving and receiving head from little boys is not my idea of entertainment.
-
Well, this is my second favorite book in the Vampire Chronocle series (the first is Blackwood Farm, then this, then The Vampire Lestat!). The reason I love this book is not only the character (Armand, who is without a doubt my favorite!! Sorry Lestat! You're second!), but also the fact that he dictates his story from when he was a boy and how he grew up for a few years in Venice, Itlay with Marius during the Renaissance. That time happens to be my favorite modern (1500's to present) historical time period. The Renaissance was the beginning of modern times and Anne Roce is able to capture it wonderfully. For anyone who is into any history, you'll be pleasantly surprised at how accurate she was in her descriptions. For those who aren't into history, the stroy is very captivating in itself to hold your attention. It is a little morbid at times, but it goes along with the story. A very very good book!!
-
What I got from this Novel, is that it is a book about Love, and secondary of Faith. Now u may be saying wait a minute, oh no, must of have been a pre-cursor to Twilight, (which BTW I have not read yet). This is hardly a book bout' "Puppy Dog" teenage love
Also I have noted some controversy amongst other reviewers about the elements of Homosexuality in this book. I, as a Heterosexual, was not offended by these passages, and thought they were portrayed rather artisticaly, and not in a pornographic manner.
Here we read how Armand evolves, from childhood, to Young adulthood which physically at this point he is forever frozen in time, but continues to develop mentally and spiritually. It is also a Journey of Faith and Discovery, one which most of us go through, seeking an understanding or evidence of our Maker.
In this book u will Find several types of Love
Love of Ones Protector
Love of a Friend
Homosexual Love
Heterosexual Love
Bi- sexual Love
Love of Good
Love of Evil
Love of ones Heritage (Nationality)
Love of Expresionism (art)
Love of Ritual
Love of God
Love of Satan
Love of Neutrality
Love of Ones Parents
Love of Faith
And ultimately and I don't feel I'm "spoiling" anything here, love of one's Brother.
This is perhaps the most Dickensian Novel of A. Rice I have read, with sometimes full pages of Social Commentary. Though Interesting in themselves, well thought and written, they tended sometimes to vere from the main plot, and sometimes Bog the reader down.
This Book is also a search of Faith. Faith in one's Maker, Faith in one's Friends, Faith in Humanity.
I liked the Detail of the Feeding scenes of the Vampires, how at times they had a sense of empathy for their victims, and then just gruesome enough to remind one, You are reading a Vampire Novel.
Not the Page turner of some of Rice's Novels, but then again, i don't think she intended it to be so. Definately a worthwhile read. -
For me, The Vampire Chronicles are the be-all-end-all of vampire novels. And while I have my favorites within the series, I find myself comparing every other vampire novel I read to the entire set. So, if you want to discuss them, go ahead and send me a note. And if you're new to the vampire genre, you can't go wrong with Anne Rice. This one is my second favorite of the series.
-
I met Armand in Interview with the Vampire. He seemed like this smooth silky and a serial sort of a sort of a fellow I kinda grew a crush on. Sort of I mean. I knew I was jumping the line when I picked up this book but I really needed to know more about him. Curiosity comes with a price.
I don't know why I found this a bit difficult to read, not cos of any of that sexual nonsense everyone gets offended by these days, no, it was the nature of his life. I found it sad and full of sorrow. A lost soul sort of. Then I saw the movie adaptation of Interview with the Vampire with Antonio Banderas as Armand.. Need I say more?
I like Anne Rice's writing. It's dark, erotic and gothic in its own way. Her writing has it's own taste. It's been a while sine I read her. Maybe it's time to pick up where I left from. -
The Apassionata has been the official soundtrack of this book ever since Armand described how wonderful it was Sybelle playing it. I confess that my very favorite sonata from Beethoven has always been the joyful and sarcastic Pathétique; but, yes, I agree that the first one fits better the waves of different feelings Anne Rice was able to depict in another good novel. And as I have always been very fond of the imaginary surrounding the Vampires, of course it was yet a great pleasure reading this diary. As I told you personally, dear friend, you gave me a rather pornographic book. But don't be sorry and, please, don't blush like that. The images are very well placed; how could she write about the life of a Russian boy saved from captivity by an antique Roman senator in the XV century Venice without mentioning their beautiful intimacy of master and pupil developing also to a sexual partnership? Oh, and how wonderfully Roman Marius is. My adored and beloved Marius. It was wonderful meeting him again. I never read Rice's books in the right order since I prefer to dive into her shadows with eyes folded. I prefer to savor every paragraph with that highly anticipated feeling. And up until now I had had great surprises; this book being centered upon Armand's vision of Marius was - of course - the greatest. At least until she decided to drop from the top of her researches and run almost sloppily with the narrative, as usual. However, this always happens when she is reaching the XX century, so I wonder if it was deliberate - to show us the speed of our times compared to the classic eras where most of her characters came from. Or even if it was meant to be like that since her books are the result of old thoughts and thus come always in kaleidoscopic images. For that matter, I like Armand's way of thinking and, curiously, we have similar concepts of what people call faith. He is not my favorite, but not the least adored Child of Night from this author either. I can understand why his master loves him so; he is utterly lovable in essence. But still, I envy Pandora more than him for how Marius loves her. Or I do for now, because I haven't read his own diary yet. I am curious, painfully curious to read his vision of all things I saw through the eyes of so many others. I am thirsty for his own picture of himself as I am sure I'll find many similar things between us. We are Historians, after all, and we seem to love books more than anything else in the world. We are lonely creatures, although we love and inspire love in others. But is only inside our study room, close to our rolls of parchment, our ink and quill that we truly find peace. I wish I could read his mind now. Unfortunately, though, History awaits for me. I've been neglecting her for two or more weeks because of him, so I ought to go back and be with her a little while praying to find Marius' book on a shelf next time I visit a bookstore.
"I know history, I read it as others read their Bibles and I will not be satisfied until I have unearthed all stories that are written and knowable, and cracket the codes of all cultures that had left me any tentalizing evidence that I might pry loose from earth or stone or papyrus or clay." (...) "I know nothing because I know too much, and understand not nearly enough and never will". Marius de Romanus, pages 449 and 451. -
Yo a los 14 años: Wow, qué desgraciados e incomprendidos son estos vampiros, qué trágico su destino de pasar cientos de años reflexionando sobre la naturaleza del bien y el mal.
Yo a los 25: Armand. Te lo suplico. Armand. Cállate cinco minutos. Ni más te pido, Armand. Cinco minutos. Búscate un hobby, Armand. Lo que sea. Ahora está super de moda el ganchillo, pero si no te gusta, estoy segura de que en cientos de años se te puede ocurrir algo que hacer. Cualquier cosa que no sea dar la turra hasta el infinito, Armand. Que menuda tarde me estás dando, Armand. Que te gusta más el sonido de tu voz que a un tonto un lápiz, Armand. -
I was good up to about a quarter of the way into the book where suddenly all plot and personality of beloved characters fell to pieces and into a train wreck of a novel. I didn't finish the whole thing because I couldn't bring myself to watch as the corpses of perfectly good characters where poorly forced around the novel. After finishing Armand's origins just close the book, put it down and walk away. After reading what I did of this book I had to go into a detox using Let The Right One In to regain my faith in the vampire genre.
-
On my seventh re-read of this book, I feel like I'm finally ready to say something about it. I went through several reviews and apparently this book either falls between complete love for it or complete contempt for it, and I think this applies to Armand as well.
In my personal experience, every time I pick up this book I find something new and unexpected. Yes, it may be contradictory. Yes, it may be too sexual for some eyes. Yes, it may be a bit blasphemous for some believer. And finally, yes, it may be focused on the religious and prone to digressions on the topic but I honestly think there's a wonderfully simple explanation for all this and it falls on Armand's own character, and a very intriguing and interesting character he is, indeed.
"Let me try, and let him hurt me, and then be satisfied, and turn away." – page 368
Andrei, Amadeo, Armand is simply driven by the martyr complex [and very close to the Borderline Personality Disorder]. Early negative experiences, misconceptions about the nature of self, life in general or others, a constant fear and sense of insecurity, a maladaptive strategy to protect the self, a persona to hide all of the above. For him self-sacrifice and suffering are the only way to achieve something, either action or response from someone, the torture towards others are the demonstrations of the tortures done to him, he obtains pleasure in the moral and physical torments, more towards himself than to others. His suffering makes him proud. That is the basic core of Armand.
"I have so little ability to synthesize knowledge; I deal in the immediate with a cool intensity. What was it like in Paris? Ask me if it rained of the night of Saturday, June 5, 1793. Perhaps I could tell you that." – Queen of the Damned, page 190
He lives in the moment because he is tied to the environmental circumstances that will dictate his suffering and his salvation through suffering. The loss of external structure leads to profound changes in affect, cognition and behavior in him. The emptiness he often feels when he appears to lose all (His mortal world, Marius, The Coven, Louis, Daniel) is just an unstable self-image and that is why every single time this character appears in the Vampire Chronicles, he is different. Every character that describes him in past books has a different approach to him. Everyone sees a different shade of him because he changes with every change in environment and interaction. Even in this book, his autobiography, he is never the same in his real convictions. Defiant pious little Andrei in the Monastery of the Caves, sexual and curious pleasure and pain/love and hate seeker Amadeo in Venice, self-tortured, externally violent and numb Armand in the Paris’ Coven, and utterly lost-and-found Armand in the centuries to come.
It is interesting to note that throughout all of the Vampire Chronicles he is the only one who changes names, and they are always names given to him by others. David may change bodies but stay the English scholar. Lestat may go to Heaven and to Hell but still be the Brat Prince. But Armand is known between them as the Boticelli Angel, the one who is known on the outside but never on the inside completely understood, by himself and by others.
Bound to his mortal youth, self-tortured and driven by martyrdom, he is contradictory out of his own nature. Attached still as every other character in his immortality to his mortal world, a world of denial and absence in the land of his birthplace Russia and a world of possibility and endless abundance of his adopted Venice, the contradiction and duality in personality is forever present. Driven to the extremes as any youth is prone to do: pleasure-pain, passivity-aggressivity, total acceptance-complete defiance, and most importantly and exposed outright in this book, hope-hopelessness.
I could continue talking about Armand’s character and its twists and turns, rise and falls, and yet the picture could never be complete. This book may not be strong in plot development for we see only a further expansion of the stories told in several books past, but this is and will always be my favorite book of the Vampire Chronicles. And I may contradict myself in the future, who knows. For now I know that Armand holds a spell over me as strongly as he did five years ago, when I first read this book, and he will continue to hold it, who knows for how long. -
Overall, my favorite part of this book doesn't even begin until more than three-quarters of the way through. Armand has a VERY tragic story, and I do enjoy getting to see exactly how he became the immortal monster he is today. And Venice of any age is a great setting for a story. But so often things get bogged down in the details. Armand's love affair with Marius, his fight to keep from remembering his life as a poor Russian artist and Marius' fight to resist making Armand into a vampire too early, it's all so DENSE. I think one read of his whole drawn-out vision involving a Russian Easter Egg will last me a lifetime.
No, the best part is when Armand gives a point-by-point description of all the other vampires in the series. It's very short, but I love getting to see these characters through Armand's eyes. In some ways it turns everything I've thought about some of them sideways. And there's one description of what REALLY happened in a previous book that is probably one of the most shocking things I've read in this series. I'm a little hesitant to reccommend this book to anyone who loved "Interview with the Vampire", just because I'm afraid that one scene will ruin it for them.
My next favorite section is Armand's platonic love affair with two young human children. I think we see here more of Anne Rice's daydreams about using fantastic amounts of money to turn life into a playground for people who have grown up poor or abused. I can't even say anything more about this part without giving away major parts of the story, but it's definitely a section I can read over and over again. -
I had a difficult time rating the book - couldn't decide between 3 and 4 stars. I hope I can voice more clearly what I loved and disliked about it once I write my review.
------------------------
Looking back after almost 3 weeks I start to remember the positive parts of the story more clearly than those annoying aspects that continue to drive me crazy for the last couple of books in this series. I love the way Rice displays vampires. I like the way she writes about their past and incorporates the information into the story. I actually don't mind that she uses the same way of telling - one huge flashback spanning a couple of centuries. It still works although I hope something new will follow soon because there are at least 7 more books in the series.
Getting to know Armand better was lovely although I still have unanswered questions when it comes to his motive for killing Claudia.
The only downside is Rice's obsession with Christianity. She has her own take on it but it's too overwhelming for me. I actually enjoy confronting vampires with profound (religious) questions but since this seems to be the only topic for the last books I just look forward to something new. Maybe going back to historical fiction or focussing more on the vampire movement as a whole. Still plenty potential left. -
Una historia aburrida, que no despega nunca quizás porque no hay un hilo argumental que lleve la historia, quizás porque los personajes son contradictorios, débiles y poco interesantes, quizás porque hay una combinación de todo esto. El conflicto religioso de Armand/Amadeo/Andrei no tiene ni pies ni cabeza y sus cambios de personalidad son tan violentos que resultan incomprensibles.
La única razón por la que le doy dos estrellas en lugar de una es porque Anne Rice sabe muchísimo de historia, arte y arquitectura, y eso se trasluce en sus libros. Su recreación de la Venecia de fines del siglo XV es maravillosa y sus escenarios son soberbios. Sin embargo, la descripción de personajes es realmente patética... Ya estoy aburrido de que cada vampiro es más "bello", "angelical", "hermoso" y "poderoso" que el anterior. Y (SPOILER) estoy hasta la coronilla de que cada vez que introducen un personaje humano interesante, lo transformen en vampiro. -
I had a lot of expectations when I first started this book. But I have to say, it definitely lived up to my expectations. Anne Rice has done other interviews, including "The Interview With The Vampire" and "The Vampire Lestat". So I assumed it would just be a re-write of one of those. But "The Vampire Armand" paints a totally different picture. Instead of her usual New Orleans setting, this book takes place in Russia, Italy, and even France! She definitely did everything she could in this book, she even manages a warm golden glow to everything she describes.
I have to say that out of all the books I have read this year, this one is at the top of my list. :) -
Another in depth book about Armand, one of the characters in the vampire series for Anne Rice. Excellent, in depth, book that explains his wonderful character, that the other books just touched upon. Great read.
-
anne rice mentioned that if this book did not come across as extremely sad and horrifying, then she had failed. let's say she was successful in every aspect.
sometimes you find a book that, for some reason or another, speaks to you on a personal level and it is very hard to try and be "objective" or fair (even if it is impossible), and this is my case with the vampire armand. while the last 2 installments of the vampire chronicles have been somewhat disappointing, this one was able to capture the essence and soul of the series that made me fall in love with it in the first book, interview with the vampire.
armand is such an unique character, an other among others, one of the most compelling and interesting in the entire series. he is a figure of in-betweenness when it comes to his nature, personality and religious beliefs; duality is the main characteristic that defines armand and it surrounds the entire narrative from beginning to end.
the writing was gorgeous, the first half of the book kept me glued to the pages to the extent that i had to restrain myself in case i finished it too quickly. i had been looking forward to armand's story for a while, and i wanted to truly enjoy it. but in the second one anne rice starts to show herself. her own voice and struggles with her faith almost take complete control of armand and his story. she really made her own duality with religion everyone's problem and, while it was not as dense as in previous lestat's books (anne rice truly, really uses lestat as an extension of her own self and her identity), i think it is still worth mentioning. i'm not a religious person, but again i do understand why some people would struggle with tvc because of this theme, especially considering how extense and recurrent it is.
now, is this the best book miss rice has written? no. is it one of the best books i have ever read? no. would i reread it a hundred times and give it, every time, 5 stars? well, yes. this is exactly what i wanted, a book dedicated to my favourite character, an unreliable narrator somehow trying to justify all the atrocities he has commited by familiarising readers with his life story. it was fun, it was painful, it was stupid, it was sad and captivating and i cannot stop thinking about it. -
This next installment in the Vampire Chronicles continues from the end of Memnoch the Devil. David Talbot approaches Armand to convince him to share his life story with him. Up until now, we have only viewed Armand through the lens of others and from a distance, knowing him to be the "Botticelli Angel", the beautiful eternal adolescent.
We now get taken back to Venice 500 years prior to where Armand is a young slave brought over from Russia and rescued by Marius, the ancient vampire, who takes him into his coven of young and beautiful boys. It follows Armand's pampered life as a human living in Marius' little harem during the Italian Renaissance, and follows through to his transition into a vampire. It didn't really cover much of what happened in Paris, as this was covered in Interview With the Vampire, but I would have liked a bit more of a recap.
Whilst Anne Rice's novels in this series always hint at the homoerotic, this one was much more so. Armand, for the young little thing he was, really got around and experimented.
This novel further follows from the religious musings in Memnoch the Devil, grappling with God and the Devil, good and evil.
I don't know why I didn't enjoy this one as much as the others. Perhaps I missed Lestat. -
The first half of this book was absolute rubbish. It was basically random assorted sexual encounters, interspersed with the parts of Armand's backstory we already learned in other books. The second half was of passing interest, I enjoyed the story picking up where it left off, and learning what happened to Armand after the end of the last book - but some of the main plot points were pretty confusing. (And Armand and Anne Rice through Armand seem to make note of this....).
What absolutely has to be mentioned is the fact that I don't understand how we are supposed to take Marius. He is so often written as this wise, kind, ancient vampire worthy of deference. Even during Armand's backstory he is saving these boys and helping them launch successful lives. BUT HE IS ALSO MOLESTING THEM. I don't care about whether or not it is mutual, they are boys. Sure, he saved them from the terrible situations that they were in, essentially saving their lives - but he is certainly no noble, wise, ancient hero-champion standing up for little boys. And at no point is this ever addressed or discussed, everyone seems completely ok with what was going on. Ok, sure, different time, he is a vampire and could just kill them, yes he saved their lives - but he molests countless boys, and not one character has one questioning thought about it? I liked Marius more when I knew less about him.
Anyway, this was far from her best book. Certainly hoping things improve in later entries. -
4 stars. Armand is my second favorite character in this series. I’m not sure what that says about me as a person but I also don’t really care. He is absolutely fascinating and I’ve been waiting to get to his book and I was not disappointed.
I loved getting Armand’s backstory. He has had a very interesting life. There were a lot of heavy moments in this because of the things he went through and it honestly really explains why he is the way that he is. I enjoyed getting to really get to know and understand his character more.
On the flip side, this was a bit slow and the ending seemed to drag on. It seemed to drag on forever but the ending wrapped up really well. This was still a very good and entertaining read despite that and I cannot wait to continue on with the series. -
I wish I hadn't bought that book. Anne really screwed up this opportunity to shed some light on a key character in her Marius-Lestat arc but she blew it. If only his years at the cult would have been more revealed, and the two orphans from WTFland would have been removed the book would have become a wonderful piece of fiction.
-
2.5✨
As the one and only Nicki Minaj once said: "I don't even know why you bother at this point/Like give it up." That’s how I feel. -
Content Warning: pedophilia, sexual abuse, rape, grooming, minor/adult relationship, death (including that of children), violence, murder, abduction, physical abuse, parental abuse, emotional/verbal abuse.
Please Note: This review contains discussion of sexual abuse, grooming, and pedophilia.
Born in the Kievan Rus, Andrei is a peasant, a painter of ikons so beautiful they are otherworldly. When he is abducted by Tartars to be sold into sex slavery in Constantinople, he gives up on any hope of a promising future -- but when he is sold again into a Venetian brothel, he is taken to live with the mysterious, beautiful Marius. Wealthy beyond imagining, and a fellow painter himself, he keeps a household of orphan boys he has tutored, wishing to make them into future noblemen, lawyers and men of status. Enchanted by the new world he finds himself in, Andrei becomes Amadeo, and quickly falls beneath Marius' spell. But Marius, of course, has a secret: he is a vampire. Desperate to be blessed with the Dark Gift, Amadeo ends up cursed forever as a boy of only seventeen, and when a dangerous cult of vampires come to their doorstep, he will become Armand -- the ethereal, fascinating, sometimes manipulative vampire whom Louis falls in love with in Interview with the Vampire.
Armand is one of my all-time favorite characters (not just from the Vampire Chronicles series, but from any, ever), but I've never read his book. I stopped reading the series after Tale of the Body Thief, which I found off-putting in pretty much every sense. I did pick up Memnoch the Devil, the book that directly precedes this one, but only made it about halfway through -- enough, however, to understand what's going on in this one. I'm so happy I decided to start up with this series again, though, because The Vampire Armand is a beautiful, heartrending journey of pain, religion, and the aftermath of trauma.
Captivating, as he has been in every book he's featured in, Armand finally gets a chance to tell us his story in his own words. Though we learn some of his past in The Vampire Lestat, it doesn't really compare to this firsthand account, full of sumptuous detail and Armand's yearning to be wanted and loved, beyond his beauty or his sexuality. This isn't easy to read, by any means: although there are no graphic details about the abuse he experiences at the hands of his captors, those experiences nonetheless color his narrative and his character. Like many victims of sexual abuse, he is promiscuous, using it as a sort of self-harm, struggling to find a healthy way to express his sexuality. It's heartbreaking, especially when we see that, in the aftermath, he feels empty.
Like all of Rice's books, the descriptions are florid and quite gorgeous. One of the main focuses in this novel is Armand's relationship with Marius, his "rescuer" and maker. I put "rescuer" in quotation marks because the truth of the matter is, Marius is no better than any of the other men who have bought and sold Armand before. I loved this book, but that's one of the big reasons why I simply couldn't give it five stars. Rice romanticizes his so-called "romance" with Marius, who not only continues to take advantage of him (when he is a child, by the way) but also physically, verbally, and emotionally abuses him. It's one of the problems with the series as a whole, this sort of brushing off of the breaking of boundaries and the idea that because they are not bound by usual rules, there's no use in moralizing. I, personally, disagree. It's too big of an issue to really delve into completely here, but please keep it in mind if you read this, and I just want to make it clear that I found their relationship disheartening and disgusting.
Difficult as it is to ignore those deeply unsavory aspects, I did enjoy the rest of the novel, particularly Armand's conflict with religion, his desire to understand and love his God, and what exactly that means for a creature of the night who drinks the blood of unsuspecting victims. It's impossible not to sympathize with him, this eternal boy who has spent his whole life at the mercy of others, even when he thinks he has found a way out. You want the best for him, regardless of the horrible things he's also done in the past. He's complex, layered, and if you love him, this is truly worth the read.
It's hard to recommend this, with all that I've mentioned above, but if you are a fan of the series, I think you'll enjoy it. Just speaking personally, I loved it, and if you are a longtime Armand fan, do yourself a favor and pick it up.
