Book Review: The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires, by Grady Hendrix
A nostalgic 90s Southern-fried vampire story.
Quirk Books, 2020, 404 pages
Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias meet Dracula in this Southern-flavored supernatural thriller set in the '90s about a women's book club that must protect its suburban community from a mysterious and handsome stranger who turns out to be a real monster.
Patricia Campbell's life has never felt smaller. Her ambitious husband is too busy to give her a goodbye kiss in the morning, her kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she's always a step behind on thank-you notes and her endless list of chores. The one thing she has to look forward to is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime and paperback fiction. At these meetings they're as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are marriage, motherhood, and neighborhood gossip.
This predictable pattern is upended when Patricia meets James Harris, a handsome stranger who moves into the neighborhood to take care of his elderly aunt and ends up joining the book club. James is sensitive and well-read, and he makes Patricia feel things she hasn't felt in 20 years. But there's something off about him. He doesn't have a bank account, he doesn't like going out during the day, and Patricia's mother-in-law insists that she knew him when she was a girl, an impossibility.
When local children go missing, Patricia and the book club members start to suspect James is more of a Bundy than a Beatnik, but no one outside of the book club believes them. Have they read too many true crime books, or have they invited a real monster into their homes?
I wanted to pit Dracula against my mom.
As you’ll see, it’s not a fair fight.
I am a Grady Hendrix fan. All of his books appear (from the names and cover blurbs) to be wild romps through pop culture with a bit of zany Lovecraftian or Satanic or undead-flavored horror. But they're really not that. They are wild romps through pop culture that take their Lovecraftian, Satanic, or undead themes seriously. Sure, there is humor and a lot of shout-outs to all the media that Grady Hendrix loves, but when the bad things happen, they are really bad and the people dealing with these bad things don't trade Whedonesque quips while trying to save the world.
The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is full of grim humor while taking itself seriously enough that the vampire is never a joke.
Patricia Campbell, the main protagonist, is a housewife in a small Southern town who gave up her nursing career to support her husband, Carter, an ambitious psychiatrist, and his aging mother. She joined the local book club to make friends and get out of the house, but they're sick of the treacly religious self-help books and "classics" being forced on them. Instead, they start reading steamy romances and true crime novels while sharing gossip and complaints about their husbands.
Then a stranger comes to town: a man named James Harris. James Harris is handsome and suave and rootless, and as soon as he arrives, things start feeling "off," even as he increasingly worms himself into the good graces of the community. Soon he's a pillar of the little town, with all the book club's husbands tied up in business deals with him.
"We are men of standing in this community," Bennett said. His voice carried extra weight because he hadn’t spoken yet. "Our children go to school here, we have spent our lives building our reputations, and y’all were going to make us laughingstocks because you’re a bunch of crazy housewives with too much time on your hands."
Hendrix keeps up the tension very effectively throughout the book. The reader knows what James Harrison is immediately and gets to watch Patricia trying to come to grips with the idea that this strange, unsettling man isn't just a drug dealer or a child molester, but a literal creature of the night. Even when she comes to grip with it, what is she supposed to do about it?
There is actually more tension with her husband, her children, and her friends than there is with James Harrison. Much of this book is not about a vampire, but about a housewife realizing how small her world has become. Patricia and her fellow book club members all struggle in various ways with their marriages and their less-than-supportive husbands. There is as much Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias here as Dracula and Salem's Lot. There's a bit of 90s feminism, and also a bit of 90s racial reckoning, with the obligatory black woman who's there to remind the nice white housewives that the children of the small, impoverished black community were going missing before they ever started noticing something wrong.
"You protected yourself, but you didn’t do a thing for the children of Six Mile because they weren’t worthwhile to you. Well, now he’s coming after your children."
This is a proper horror novel, though, not a feminist comedy with a vampire. James Harris is as nasty a piece of work as anything created by Stephen King or Bram Stoker, and there is body horror, sexual abuse, and dead children. With very dry humor and a lot of 90s shoutouts, The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires delivers a suitably gruesome climax, and not everyone gets away cleanly.
So far, I have enjoyed all of Grady Hendrix's books, and while this one might not have been my favorite, it definitely joins my list of "vampire books for vampire book lovers."
Also by Grady Hendrix: My reviews of Paperbacks from Hell, We Sold Our Souls, Horrorstör, My Best Friend's Exorcism, and The Final Girl Support Group.
My complete list of book reviews.
Quirk Books, 2020, 404 pages
Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias meet Dracula in this Southern-flavored supernatural thriller set in the '90s about a women's book club that must protect its suburban community from a mysterious and handsome stranger who turns out to be a real monster.
Patricia Campbell's life has never felt smaller. Her ambitious husband is too busy to give her a goodbye kiss in the morning, her kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she's always a step behind on thank-you notes and her endless list of chores. The one thing she has to look forward to is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime and paperback fiction. At these meetings they're as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are marriage, motherhood, and neighborhood gossip.
This predictable pattern is upended when Patricia meets James Harris, a handsome stranger who moves into the neighborhood to take care of his elderly aunt and ends up joining the book club. James is sensitive and well-read, and he makes Patricia feel things she hasn't felt in 20 years. But there's something off about him. He doesn't have a bank account, he doesn't like going out during the day, and Patricia's mother-in-law insists that she knew him when she was a girl, an impossibility.
When local children go missing, Patricia and the book club members start to suspect James is more of a Bundy than a Beatnik, but no one outside of the book club believes them. Have they read too many true crime books, or have they invited a real monster into their homes?
I wanted to pit Dracula against my mom.
As you’ll see, it’s not a fair fight.
I am a Grady Hendrix fan. All of his books appear (from the names and cover blurbs) to be wild romps through pop culture with a bit of zany Lovecraftian or Satanic or undead-flavored horror. But they're really not that. They are wild romps through pop culture that take their Lovecraftian, Satanic, or undead themes seriously. Sure, there is humor and a lot of shout-outs to all the media that Grady Hendrix loves, but when the bad things happen, they are really bad and the people dealing with these bad things don't trade Whedonesque quips while trying to save the world.
The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is full of grim humor while taking itself seriously enough that the vampire is never a joke.
Patricia Campbell, the main protagonist, is a housewife in a small Southern town who gave up her nursing career to support her husband, Carter, an ambitious psychiatrist, and his aging mother. She joined the local book club to make friends and get out of the house, but they're sick of the treacly religious self-help books and "classics" being forced on them. Instead, they start reading steamy romances and true crime novels while sharing gossip and complaints about their husbands.
Then a stranger comes to town: a man named James Harris. James Harris is handsome and suave and rootless, and as soon as he arrives, things start feeling "off," even as he increasingly worms himself into the good graces of the community. Soon he's a pillar of the little town, with all the book club's husbands tied up in business deals with him.
"We are men of standing in this community," Bennett said. His voice carried extra weight because he hadn’t spoken yet. "Our children go to school here, we have spent our lives building our reputations, and y’all were going to make us laughingstocks because you’re a bunch of crazy housewives with too much time on your hands."
Hendrix keeps up the tension very effectively throughout the book. The reader knows what James Harrison is immediately and gets to watch Patricia trying to come to grips with the idea that this strange, unsettling man isn't just a drug dealer or a child molester, but a literal creature of the night. Even when she comes to grip with it, what is she supposed to do about it?
There is actually more tension with her husband, her children, and her friends than there is with James Harrison. Much of this book is not about a vampire, but about a housewife realizing how small her world has become. Patricia and her fellow book club members all struggle in various ways with their marriages and their less-than-supportive husbands. There is as much Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias here as Dracula and Salem's Lot. There's a bit of 90s feminism, and also a bit of 90s racial reckoning, with the obligatory black woman who's there to remind the nice white housewives that the children of the small, impoverished black community were going missing before they ever started noticing something wrong.
"You protected yourself, but you didn’t do a thing for the children of Six Mile because they weren’t worthwhile to you. Well, now he’s coming after your children."
This is a proper horror novel, though, not a feminist comedy with a vampire. James Harris is as nasty a piece of work as anything created by Stephen King or Bram Stoker, and there is body horror, sexual abuse, and dead children. With very dry humor and a lot of 90s shoutouts, The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires delivers a suitably gruesome climax, and not everyone gets away cleanly.
So far, I have enjoyed all of Grady Hendrix's books, and while this one might not have been my favorite, it definitely joins my list of "vampire books for vampire book lovers."
Also by Grady Hendrix: My reviews of Paperbacks from Hell, We Sold Our Souls, Horrorstör, My Best Friend's Exorcism, and The Final Girl Support Group.
My complete list of book reviews.