The Vampire Lestat

The Vampire Chronicles, Book 2

By: Anne Rice

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 21 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's summary

Once an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-revolutionary France, now Lestat is a rockstar in the demonic, shimmering 1980s. He rushes through the centuries in search of others like him, seeking answers to the mystery of his terrifying exsitence. His story, the second volume in Anne Rice's best-selling Vampire Chronicles, is mesmerizing, passionate, and thrilling.

Listen to more of the Vampire Chronicles.

©1985 Anne Rice (P)2011 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Frightening, sensual.... Anne Rice will live on through the ages of literature.... To read her is to become giddy as if spinning through the mind of time, to become lightheaded as if our blood is slowly being drained away." ( San Francisco Chronicle)

Finally unabridged! Excellently read, great listen

This has always been my favourite novel from the Vampire Chronicles series (even though Interview with the Vampire is more popular) but I've always held off downloading it from Audible because it was only available abridged (aka butchered) but when this edition became available I downloaded this, Interview and Queen of the Damned immediately!

I've read the paperback edition of this book many times but Simon Vance narrates very well and captures the cheeky, elegant character of Lestat very well and brings out some subtleties that I've missed before.

This novel stands alone very well if you haven't read the other Anne Rice books since it only makes a few references to Interview with the Vampire.

I hope Audible will release more unabridged Anne Rice books (The Mayfair Witch novels!).

Great read.

Great book with great narration. Stimulates one's imaginations and curiosity on the topic. Highly recommend this.

Great sequel

This book is so much better than the first! Anne Rice is at her peak

Pretty decent

Another sitting on the shelf finally done!

My Review - Good

Interview with a Vampire is an epic romantic tale if supernatural beings, Vampires. It matches the movie in quality and burning emotion and this book, it's sequel, shares in that characteristic. Following the coolest vampire of them all, Lestat, I couldn't wait to hear this story. It does lull at a certain point, that made me have to revisit the story at a later time, but after that, I found this to be enthralling and left me wanting more. Queen of the Damned is up next and it has a lot to live upto.

Completely enthralling.

I loved it. This volume of the vampire chronicles was the one I was looking for. it answers so many questions. I cant wait to start the Queen of the Damned.

Book and Performance Review

Book Review

I had decided to read Anne Rice’s Queen of the Damned after Reading some comments on the review for the film adaptation, as the film was a favourite of mine growing up(More on this in the review of that book). The jest of which was when compared to the book the film adaptation was comparable to the substance left by the neighbour’s dog on ones lawn. I wanted to give the film the benefit of the doubt as again there was a bias there. I set out to read Queen of the Damned, but felt that if I really wanted to understand the contempt these people felt towards the film I had to start from the beginning. I had listened to the audiobook for Interview and from what I could recall wasn’t exactly critical to book 3 so I started here at The Vampire Lestat.

This was my introduction to what I call “Adult Fiction” as prior to this I had only read “required” readings for school, and only read excerpts from them never actually reading the full book hence the quotations around the word required. If it wasn’t that I had also only previously read the Harry Potter series. Anne Rice doesn’t expressly state that Lestat is in love with Nicky, Gabrielle and the other characters. It is truly up to how the reader wishes to interpret the love Lestat feels for them.

Performance Review

I thoroughly enjoyed the performance of Simon Vance, I have heard a fair amount of audiobooks through Audible and can say Simon Vance is among my favourites. Vance isn’t monotone in his delivery and reads the narrative and speech in different tones, although not as well as say Jim Dale, but regardless it isn’t a chore to listen to Vance. There is also the fact that Simon Vance has consistently read the Vampire Chronicles up to book 5 instead of switching between narrators for each book.

Simon Vance is perfect

This is one of my favorite books ever and I loved listening to it! Simon Vance was amazing.

Excellent narration

I absolutely love Simon Vance! It makes it hard to listen to anyone else narrate! He does an amazing job!

Woot!

Excellent, captivating story, legendary characters, superb narration, even the long, philosophical diatribes were great.

A gripping story

This is when the vampire chronicles gain momentum and flesh out the stories of the past as well as connecting them to modern day.

My favourite character in the book is Marius as he remains as enigmatic as the queen mother herself if not more. His philosophy is very close to mine as well.

The book really keeps you on the edge of your seat and there's more action in it than in the Interview. I have been re-reading the chronicles and they are still as exciting and gripping as a decade ago when I read the books as a teen.