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25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
David Wellington is the Emperor of the Undead, May 22, 2007
This review is from: 13 Bullets (Paperback)
David Wellington burst onto the scene in 2006 with Monster Island: A Zombie Novel, a harbinger of a gritty, new, real-world approach to zombies. A year later and he's at it again with 13 BULLETS, and he does not disappoint.
Wellington grabs the traditional vampire story by the throat, slices the jugular and shakes it like a rabid dog shredding a tattered chew-toy. Forget the trite and tired notions of gothic mansions, crypts, well-dressed vamps and "poor me" undead who pine away for one impossibly passionate experience after another: these vamps are nasty, dirty, brutal and hungry. You could look for the delicate, tell-tale poke-holes in a victim's neck, if you could even find the neck, that is - most times it's ripped out of the body along with bits of chest, shoulder, and most of the internal organs.
13 BULLETS is to vampire stories what lethal gladiatorial games are to formalized boxing. If you want blood, you got it.
The story drags a bit in the middle - you can only see so many vamp victims before they all start to sound like a single mangled mass - but he has a surprise at the end that will totally catch you off guard. Wellington opens with a bang, guides you through one woman's nightmare, then manages to flip the script and go beyond nightmare to the deepest pits of physical and emotional hell.
And don't forget the Wellington trademark ending: swarming masses of rotting corpses coming for your blood. Of course he fields an army - what else would you expect from the new Emperor of the Undead?
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Pure brilliance!, May 22, 2007
This review is from: 13 Bullets (Paperback)
David started with the undead genre, he took it, made it his own and created a universe unsurpassed by any other author or even filmmaker. His take on the idea of an undead apocolypse was both fresh and in the true sense original. The interest shown by his online following and those who discovered him through the printed novels is testiment to how he ensnares you with the pace, content and original ideas inherent to his writing.
I was never keen on the vampire genre, It sparked ideas in my brain of a cursed nobleman in a castle draining the blood of pale skinned virgins and ensaring them in some silly love pact until the local villagers burned him out of house and home. But David has done it again, he has taken this overdone and tired genre and made it new and exciting, his characters are real and you feel for them and their struggle against their vampiric nemesis. The vampires themselves have been re-invented, gone are the ideas of nobility or romance, these creatures exist purely to feed, kill and cause suffering. The characters are real, Special deputy Arkeley & Officer Laura Caxton have as many flaws as us all and it makes their struggle more personal to the reader.
You will not be dissapointed!
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Publisher's Weekly, "surprisingly anticlimactic finale"... What the...?!?, June 30, 2008
This review is from: 13 Bullets (Paperback)
In reading the synopsis by Publisher's Weekly, I was reminded by the limitations of "established media." The reviewer of this publication described the climax as anti-climatic.
How do I say this without giving anything away... For me, "13 Bullets" was a pretty good book BUT the ending was classic, and for me, it is what made the book stand out.
I think the reviewer was expecting the predictable "blandly satisfying" ending that is typical to these types of stories. I can't describe more without giving anything away.
I will say that I thought the ending was one of the most clever, ironically humorous, and memorable endings I've ever read. I've enjoyed all of Wellington's books (I had originally read them online but later bought each publication out of thanks and homage.) For me, "13 Bullets" would have been one of his least memorable books except for the ending (I'm biased towards post-apocalyptic fiction.)
It was a perfect ending... along the lines of the originally published ending to Stephen King's "The Stand". In that book, as originally published, the ending was a classic which I loved. In "The Stand", the story was epic in scope and any ending would have been a quickly drawn let down (as with so many other epic books that have built up the story so much.) Yadda, yadda... most of those books have the good guys win in a conventional and spectacular way where the bad guys get what's coming to them. But in the original publication of "The Stand", King ended that novel by nuking the city because a lunatic accidentally drops a nuclear bomb down a set of stairs. How classic! To me, it seemed that King had built the story line and expectation so much that no ending would have been suitable. So, he just had it end in a stupid meaningless act... which, BTW, doesn't life usually play out that way? Of course, later on in a subsequent publication which included the insertion of the originally deleted 400 pages and original ending, the conclusion came with the hand of God dropping the bomb on the bad guys. The ultimate example of the good guys winning... but far less interesting and clever and what Publisher's Weekly would want to expect.
Such is the case with "13 Bullets"... God, I'm just itching to tell the punch line! Suffice it to say that the ending is consistent with the story but it is so unexpected and so humorous and satisfying on so many levels. And unlike, "The Stand," where I describe the ending as a stupid act, the end of this book is smart and totally consistent with the slayer's character. Publisher's Weekly lacks the sophistication to appreciate it.
For the ending alone, 13 Bullets deserves 5 stars. Otherwise, I would have given it a 3 and a half stars. I read it last year as well as more than 50 other books since then. The ending makes this books stand out the most.
If you want a bland and predictable book, then craft your booklist from Publisher's Weekly or Time Magazine. I, however, prefer a little imagination and originality.
And this book has the most original ending for any vampire book or movie I know of.
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