"Bloodsucking Fiends" by Christopher Moore

Reading this book felt like reading a comic book without any pictures. This is not because there was excessive dialogue (although on the other hand it's certainly not filled with deep thoughts), and it wasn't the unrealistic premise (vampires running amok in San Francisco), because the unrealistic premises of The Time Traveler's Wife and The Amnesiac gave me absolutely no problem. The thing that made me feel like I was reading a two-dimensional book of action and humor is because the book is entirely peopled, not with characters, but with caricatures.

I must admit I might have been more impressed with this book if I hadn't just read The Time Traveler's Wife (a hard act to follow) and if I weren't so eager to dive into The Girl Who Could Fly (which promises to be Little Mutants on the Prairie... how can you beat that?) The silliness level reminds me of Catch-22, although this book is not THAT ridiculous. In this book you find marginally intelligent people being funny, rather than so-dumb-as-to-defy-belief people being humorously stupid.

I was pretty annoyed that Jody spent the entire book trying to figure out (among other things) how exactly she was changed into a vampire. It was so obvious, from the very scene where it occurred, that it was because she drank some of the vampire's blood. She wasn't described as a stupid character, but it certainly seemed dumb of her to overlook that important point for so long. In fact, she never did figure it out on her own--the other vampire had to tell her. I was also surprised that Jody killed off Simon. That seemed like a waste of a promising character.

There is a sequel to this book (looking at the author's list of titles, I'd have to guess it's the one called You Suck) and even though I don't really want to, I feel compelled to read it, if only to find out whether Jody turns Tommy into a vampire, or Steve turns Jody back into a human, and whether Jody and Tommy remain safe from Elijah encased in bronze.

At least this book was fun and funny. My favorite line, at which I actually laughed out loud, was, "Simon looked at Tommy as if he had farted in neon." I'm not sure what that says about me if I laugh out loud about scatological humor (other than the fact that my true age must be 14). It can say what it wants. I don't mind.