Cirque du Freak: A Living Nightmare

The Saga of Darren Shan, Book 1

By: Darren Shan

Narrated by: Ralph Lister

In the tradition of Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes and Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot, New York Times best-seller Cirque du Freak is the first title in the popular Saga of Darren Shan series.

Darren Shan and his best friend, Steve, get tickets to the Cirque du Freak, a wonderfully gothic freak show featuring weird, frightening half human/half animals who interact terrifyingly with the audience. In the midst of the excitement, true terror raises its head when Steve recognizes that one of the performers - Mr. Crepsley - is a vampire!

Steve confronts the vampire after the show finishes - but his motives are surprising! In the shadows of a crumbling theater, a horrified Darren eavesdrops on his friend and the vampire, and is witness to a monstrous, disturbing plea. As if by destiny, Darren is pulled to Mr. Crepsley and what follows is his horrifying descent into the dark and bloody world of vampires.

This is Darren’s story.

©2013 Darren Shan (P)2013 Blackstone Audio

Amazing book, different Narrator.

I love this book, ever since the first time I read it. I just wished it was recorded by a young kid of like 15 rather than an older man. The voice did not fit the story.

The reader gave me chills!

The story was pretty good. The reader was absolutely excellent. His portrayal was very theatrical.

Fantastic

An amazing narration to an already amazing story. One of the best middlegrade horrors to exist. Highly recommend.

our son loved it

We love to listen to books on long rides, this one is a good one

Great Book

the book was great im going to be getting the whole collection the narrator was also good he got me into the story and not once did he break my immersion

My favorite series ever.

If you are first reading (/listening to) these now — I beg of you, please avoid spoilers. They’re everywhere anyone talks about these books. There are two major characters who it’s impossible to talk about without spoilers. For the sake of your impressions of the characters, I want you to be able to look at the first half *without* knowing the spoilers, build your impressions of everything *without* knowing the spoilers, and then compare how you saw it at the end of book 6 or 7 with what everything looks like once you know the revelations of books 9-12.

Please. I know a lot of people say they don’t care about spoilers, but please. Let the side of avoidance make our case with this series for you.

I first read these when I was 11 years old, and I keep coming back to them at least every other year. I’m 30 now.
All of my other favorite books now are the kind of dense, literary thing most people say they can’t get through. I think War and Peace is really light and enjoyable. I also hate violence. My tastes are about the opposite of what you’d think the target audience would be for something like this.

I’m just going to say, the real shining part of the series, the part that makes it worthwhile, that makes me keep coming back, is the second trilogy, books 4-6. People who are more into the action side of things tend to find those boring, since they’re more character development, philosophy, and worldbuilding. The main character’s expectations, and, probably, the reader’s, are turned on their heads and mixed around, and beliefs are challenged from plenty of angles. Those are the books that make the series worthwhile. The second half is worthwhile to see how the characters end up, but also for the underlying truths that it reveals about the events of 4-6.

But this is a review of the first book, specifically, the audiobook of it.

So.

I’ll start out by saying I’ve been avoiding these for as long as I’ve been an Audible member. I just think the narrator’s voice sounds too old for Darren. However, I’m without my paper copies at the moment, so I’m giving them a chance, and I have to say, he does a good job at capturing the adorable baby-Darren of book one.

Some lines in here will just break your heart once you’ve gotten to know the characters, and seen them grow, and struggle, … and die. The narrator’s voice quality might be clearly adult, but he captures the charm and innocence of this moment in the main character’s life. I’m looking forward to seeing how he shows Darren’s growth while maintaining that charm that he really never loses, even in the darkest points of the series.

One more note — I’m always reading these, but I haven’t been back to book 1 in quite a while. Gertha Teeth is my new fourth-favorite character. … my third-favorite appears in book 6, and has two lines of speech before dying. Yeah, it’s that kind of series. Said third-favorite also gets drawn at least 20 times in the manga adaptation, and even appears on a cover.

It’s that kind of series.

Dive in. Enjoy it. Celebrate its upcoming 25th anniversary. And please, please, as a favor to this random, wordy stranger online… *please* avoid spoilers.

Not the best thing ever but nonetheless great.

Captures your interest. I felt like Cirque du Freak, the show, should have been more central given the title.

lol funny and strong

I loved it thought it was a little fast but the guy who reads this outhouse was funny

Entertaining for kids

My 6 and 10-year-old boys love this series. It's nice that the series is included in Audible's included catalog.

quite nice

enjoyable and well done. far different than the film. may try some more of these.