Southern Book Club's Guide To Slaying Vampires - Grady Hendrix

Horror/Fiction

Rating: 8/10

A clever blend of the disaffected housewife trope with a terrifying and darkly comic vampire tale as the cherry on top.

Touted as a mash-up of Fried Green Tomatoes and Dracula, this book exudes Southern charm even as it dishes out thrills and chills enough to satisfy the appetite of any horror aficionado. But that is not all it has to offer, there is some rousing social commentary about the battle against the patriarchy.

A group of women start a true crime book club, trying to find a way to battle against the constraints of the lives they are living.  Lives where they always come last. A stranger suddenly appears in town and things start to change in some very troublesome ways.  Although these furtively feisty woman start to suspect something foul, the stranger manages to insinuate himself into their lives by stroking the pathetically flaccid egos of their husbands.

Kudos to this cheeky author for continuing to deliver horror novels that cannot be neatly plugged into a mold, no matter its shape or size.

Footnote: This novel is blood soaked and writhing with creepy crawlies…in other words, not for the squeamish!