Customer Reviews

Queen of Blood (Leisure Fiction)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Smith really lets the grue flow in this sequel to his great debut, HOUSE OF BLOOD. Fans of the original will enjoy seeing most of the old characters back for another round of madness in a new House, only this time the torture and kill-scenes are kicked up to a notch that will make fans of extreme horror grin from ear to ear. The 2nd half of this one becomes a heavy-duty action romp as opposing paramilitary armies battle to the death . . . and with Smith's break-neck pace, I can't see any horror fan not enjoying the blood-soaked ride.

I found Queen Of Blood to be a fast paced tale of murder and madness, chocked full of enough mayhem to keep the action junkie happily flipping the pages. I read it in two sittings and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you dig the likes of Laymon, Ketchum, Keene, you'll have a great time with this book.

Bryan Smith's fourth work follows several plotlines, all revolving around the survivors of his first novel (2004's House of Blood, a fun, splatterific b-movie for the mind), including Dream Weaver (a former mostly good gal who is turning a new, dark page as she discovers the depths of some nifty black magic mojo in her DNA; she is also haunted by the not-ghost of Alicia, a friend who died in the previous volume), Chad Robbins (the hubby Dream abandoned, now dating a sexpot named Allyson), and Ms. Wickman (servant of The Master of the original House of Blood, she is seeking to recreate his kingdom of suffering). Others bop in and out, of course. And there are plenty of victims to the bloodthirsty Wickman and her many fold minions. Unfortunately, a lot of the characters fall victim to the "absolute power" conundrum, going waaaaay overboard into the realms of sadism, torture and messy murder...

I suppose this has to do with the mythology of the work. At its heart wait the Death Gods, otherworldly beings who require sacrifices of human suffering and innocent blood. Well, the House of Blood (reconstituted here, as the previous incarnation received a rather impressive destruction in the eponymous book, if memory serves me correctly) acts as something of a sacrificial altar to these beings. Magic makes the place into a Baba Yaga's hut of sorts (much larger inside than out), and all who pass its boundaries pay homage either as the worshipful or as victims (or sometimes victimized worshipful). Check your civilization at the porch, through these doors lie barbarism and savagery.

At its best, it's all very Howardian. In many ways, this grim story is the modern day follow through of many of the themes and motifs found in the Hyboria or Atlantis that Conan and Kull wandered, complete with a plethora of blood drenched femme fatales offering oblations to blasphemous, cruel gods...

Now, I am a big fan of Howard's works (sword and sorcery, weird fiction, action stories, boxing, even his rather lackluster hard boiled mystery stuff), and one of the things I adore about them is the author's palate of brilliant colors. The blacks are impenetrable but countermanded by brilliant blues and seeping scarlets and... There are wide ranging vistas of color on display, in even his less than best stuff.

Here, the palate is more limited. Oh, the reds are bright enough (and plentiful, glory knows). The blacks are deep. And yet, there is little else on this canvas...

Gory violence set to a punk rock tempo can be fun, but without a realized world to play it against (and here we need two worlds, the Real World outside and the Weird World inside the Baba Yaga hut/House of Blood Redux), the work seems, well, a little cartoonish. Sure, it's of the Ralph Bakshi, adult swim on crack variety of animation (the sex is hardcore, and the violence is worse, and sometimes these occur simultaneously), but that's not enough to sustain a novel length work in my something far less than humble opinion.

However, even a lackluster plot can be fixed with either a) characters you love to love or love to hate, or b) so much style that an audience member cannot help but be overwhelmed by the technique.

Of course this model is not actually a fiction based one, but a film based one. However, it fits this novel, which has a cinematic approach.

While there are certainly plenty of loathsome characters, there aren't many that I found myself caring about. Then, what about style? Well, if it were a film, the visual technique might be stylish, but the language is the pared down, wham-bam-thank-you-man invisible prose. It's Richard Laymon quality prose, for sure, but that does little to cover over the tedium. If you see one eyeball skewered on a stiletto heel in a sexualized act of torture, you've seen `em all...

I wanted to have fun with this one...

Ah well.

I enjoyed this sequel to HOUSE OF BLOOD from beginning to end. No part of it was boring. Smith paints the reader's mind with brilliant color, imagery not soon forgotten. Gore lovers will be sated, with all the violence and creative bloodletting. Those who like crazy ladies won't be disappointed, either.

Smith doesn't let the bounds of reality limit his imagination. Several of his characters want power, or more power, and don't we all want that? There's sex and sacrifice, love and betrayal, and plain ol' mayhem. There's a whole world of hurt, too.

Smith must have had a lot of fun writing this one. I sure had a lot of fun reading it.

I've been exposing myself to a lot of new horror writers this year, the result of buying a lot of new horror novels from Leisure Books. It has given me an opportunity to see new possibilities in a genre that I'm already familiar with. Bryan Smith, based on his novel Queen of Blood, seems to be an author with real potential.

Queen of Blood is a sequel to Smith's earlier novel, House of Blood. I had not read House of Blood, so I was at a bit of a disadvantage, but still enjoyed what I read. Apparently, the first book had a powerful magic being known as the Master threatening various individuals, only a few of whom survived to make it to the sequel. Most notably, Chad Robbins and the unusually named Dream Weaver made it through the House of Blood and even had a happy ending of sorts.

The marriage of these two soon crumbles, as Dream is unable to rid herself of the dark impulses that she acquired. As Queen of Blood begins, Dream has more-or-less given in to her dark side, which will give her new powers but also put her on a killing spree. Meanwhile, Chad has moved on, but his new girlfriend Allyson is actually an agent of some bad guys; she betrays Chad, but almost immediately regrets her action as she realizes she actually loves him. Soon she and Chad are on the run and take refuge in a compound filled with other victims of the Master.

The title character is a woman named Ms. Wickman who has picked up some powers from the Master. She has rivals for the throne, however and soon there is a war among villainesses. The prize is a new House of Blood, in which the forgotten ones of society - runaways, the homeless, etc. - are kidnapped and brutally tortured, all for the sadistic pleasure of the Queen and her disciples.

Brutal is definitely the word for this book which is chock full of people being raped, maimed, mutilated and occasionally even killed. If it was a movie, it would have to be hard-pressed to merit anything other than an NC-17. Still, if you can handle it, this book is quite entertaining. Even for the field of horror, Smith is more vicious than most, and that makes Queen of Blood stand out in its own special way.

"Queen Of Blood" is the sequel to Smith's first novel "House Of Blood" which was also published by Leisure and which should be read before reading this sequel. In the sequel Smith brings back the major survivors of the previous novel. Giselle (an Acolyte who has made a deal with the death god Azaroth), the Master's Major Domo Ms. Wickman, lovers Dream Weaver & Chad Robbins, and one time rock star Jim, plus some newbies like ex-junkie and porn queen Allyson, and the psycho sisters Ellen & Marcy.

"Queen Of Blood"'s story proper starts two years after the fall of the Master's house and Ms. Wickman is building her own house. She's also building her own little Black Brigade, and is actively tracking down any of the survivors from the first novel. One of whom is Giselle, who helped lead the mutiny that brought down the Master. Giselle is tortured, and maimed, and in her despair makes another blood pact with Azaroth, a deal that will give her a huge amount of power, enough power to rebuild herself, and to contest Ms. Wickman for control of Wickman's burgeoning blood empire.

Meanwhile, Dream Weaver's life has gone on a distinct downhill slide since her escape. She's broken with Chad, has become a thieving, alcoholic, pill-popping bar crawler, when she goes afoul of Ellen, Marcy, and their crew of psycho losers. There will be gratuitous violence and drama, and Dream Weaver will eventually take control of the group's survivors, and they will go on a road trip track down Wickman all while Dream's latent powers are multiplying exponentially while her mental state is deteriorating just as fast.

The third storyline deals with Chad and his new wife Allyson, and his life is just going great. Great until Jim shows up and Allyson betrays him and lets Wickman's agents know where they are. But again, there is a twist and Chad, Allyson, and Jim go on the run, and they run to Jim's heavily armed compound. And it is here, at about the half-way that things start changing. The balance of power begins switching, as several characters start cementing their power bases, and the three separate storylines then start to coalesce into a whole.

As a stand-alone novel, this is not a bad torture porn novel, Smith's story is compulsively readable, even if the sex and gore become remarkably redundant after a while. As a sequel though, it constantly disappoints. The main reason is that most of the characters this time around are just unlikable.

In the original novel, a number of characters do a lot of unlikable things, but you know that they were doing these things to survive. Here the same characters just embrace and enjoy their evil natures, showing that Smith simply didn't know what to do with his creations. The worst offense example is Alicia. Alicia was a strong-willed, intelligent black woman who was just WASTED in the first novel, and here, Smith shows that he just doesn't know what to do with a strong black female character, as he BRINGS HER BACK and screws it up again. Alicia starts off as an evil jive-talking caricature, and ends up being just another murderous sadistic goon.

Smith is a decent writer, his writing kept my interest, and the pages kept turning in my hands, but, after a while, it just seemed that he was making it up as he went along. I mean, there will be an evil group of ninjas popping up out the blue for no good reason. Besides eventually becoming gratuitous, the violence and sex just end up being a cheap gimmick that Smith uses to keep his contrived torture porn plot moving. The only interesting character growth happens in Jim's compound as we see the cementing of Chad and Allyson's relationship, although Smith could have done a better job of it.

Smith also continues with his fascination with classic pop culture as it is obvious that Jim is James Morrison, an Asian ninja named Bai is obviously modeled after Bai Ling, a character is called Schreck after the German actor of the same name. Then like "The Freakshow", arguably Smith's best novel, we have a couple of women modeled after Joan Jett.

And worst of all, the novel has no real ending. It leaves itself open for another sequel, and Smith makes it clear that after everything that has happened, nothing has changed, nothing has really been resolved, and that all of the novel's bludgeoning sound and fury have been for naught.

House of Blood was a good start, but it deserved its three star rating, Deathbringer was much better; better characters and better pacing. The Freakshow was his best, but "Queen Of Blood" is a step backwards, as he lazily falls back on gore, foul language, violence, and sex to carry the story instead of using the plot to do that.

For this website I have reviewed Deathbringer.

Two years ago something so horrible happened that it will give you nightmares forever. A group of friends entered the House of Blood. It all was said and done only two people survived. Dream Weaver and Chad Robbins may be the lucky ones to have survived the House of Blood but they have never been the same since. Dream and Chad thought they were done with the master but they were wrong. A new evil has arisen and it's out for revenge. Ms. Wickman despises the weak but oh how she loves to hear them scream and beg for mercy. Nothing's worse than a woman's scorn.

I never read House of Blood so I can't compare the master to Ms. Wickman but from what I read of Ms. Wickman, I definitely thought she was one mean woman if you can call her that. She will bring you down as well as help you up just so she can torture you all over again. Queen of Blood has all the makings of a good horror book. It has the scary factor, creepiness, gore and it will give you nightmares. So if you want to be scared out of your wits than you need to read Queen of Blood.

Queen of Blood falls short in the story line to its predecessor, House of Blood which was much more original, however, this is to be expected being a sequel usually does lack originality. House of Blood plays out more like a typical horror novel with a hint of fantasy and epic towards the end of the book. Queen of Blood plays out like an epic sequel from start to finish. The book was slightly hollow and and flighty throughout up until the end. It also lacked the multiple plot lines of House of Blood, however, there were still some major twists and turns that were unexpected. The ending of the book is what gives the entire novel justice. The ending leaves hint for a 3rd installment to the series or at least let's hope. The violence, gore, and constant action was also a plus in the book. All in all a decent sequel and hopefully we can look forward to a trilogy.

I started this book without knowing that it was a sequel, and that may have tempered my ability to fully enjoy this book. I have not Read "House of Blood" which comes before this. Apparently, having read "House of Blood" is vital to even beginning to enjoy this book.

Short Summary: Several survivors from the House of Blood are running around and hiding from the remnants of the clan of torturers and magic users they overthrew. Ms. Wickman has taken over the House of Blood and is apparently continuing the torture and exploits of the first book, she also has sent bad guys to track down the survivors. There is an appearance of "The order of the Dragon" who apparently want the head of the House of Blood done in, though no one really understands why. So they all go around killing people until everyone who's still alive ends up back at the House of Blood for a show down.

I really don't know what to say about this book... there wasn't a good character to root for, and everyone seemed a bit stupid to be honest. It really didn't bother me when anyone died, other than the fact that none of the deaths really had any impact other than to add gore to the book. I assume I was supposed to have trailing feelings for the characters from the first book, but since I haven't read it I can say that they certainly weren't developed in this book. There is a lot of magic that wasn't really explained, several references to the multiple gods of death, and an entire city of torture was built apparently in some sort of Baba-Yaga version of a farm house. People who died in the first book are brought back to life, but that isn't fully explored, non-magical people are apparently now magical... and the order of the dragon isn't explained at all, nor their reasoning for getting rid of the head of the House of Blood, since they are a bunch of torturers too.

As far as the writing goes... there were some problems, first of all, the use of pronouns was out of whack... at times we'd switch to a new person and go for 2 to 3 pages before they are named and we know who he's talking about... then at other times he's restate the person's name every sentence, when a pronoun like "he" would have made the reader much happier to read. Descriptions of gore were spot on, but descriptions of people and places were a bit sparse...the main description of the women is of their hair and figure... but they change hair color so often that at times it confuses you as to who he's talking about. There is no synopsis of what occurred in the first book, so you have to go from clues that are dropped here and there. Also relationships are never defined so various characters act as if they know each other, but as a reader (if you haven't read the first one) you have no idea what the relationship is.

Final opinion - If you read and really enjoyed the first book, you might like this one. If you haven't read the first book, don't bother reading this, it cannot function as a stand alone book. The characters are all very flat and not very engaging. The plot is weak and haphazard. I really don't think I would recommend this to any of my friends, and this book gave me no desire to pick up and read the original.

Queen of Blood is Smith's sequel to his 2004 novel House of Blood, featuring substantially the same cast, and striking substantially the same tone, displaying the same frenetic pacing, twists and turns, and copious bloodletting as its predecessor. More like a print version of a 90 minute exploitation movie than a novel, the multi track, surreal odyssey is notable for its sheer energy and riveting, workmanlike prose, and for its ability to confound a reader's expectations. What it lacks, however, is characters to identify and empathize with; although the book will certainly have an effect on you, leaving you spent and disturbed, it's also just as likely to leave you feeling a bit empty and confused because of that lack.

With the exception of the characters Chad Robbins and the man known as Lazarus (his true identity is an odd but nice touch on Smith's part) most everyone else in this book is evil, repulsive, hateful, and, most of all, lethal; little explanation of their motivations is provided, so, after a few dozen pages of carnage, sudden death and debauchery, the killing and mayhem and forced eroticism start to feel a bit random, and strained, especially when the cycle starts up again, as it inevitably does. Unpredictable, true, outrageous, yes, but hard for the average person to relate to.

Another drawback is that not much actually transpires over the course of the book--although it starts as a novel of revenge, Smith constantly switches gears, which certainly keeps readers guessing, but ultimately seems to have no real point. Indeed, because of the occult and magical aspects of the novel, it seems as if Smith has circled back to the very beginning of House of Blood, basically reconstituting the cast of that novel by book's end. It's strange and thrilling if one powerful player is resurrected, buts it's boring and anticlimactic when almost everyone has the potential to return from the dead.

Your reaction to this novel (which is probably the middle installment of a trilogy, although that's never explicitly stated) can probably be predicted by which side you take on the old splatterpunk versus quiet horror debate--if you like lovingly rendered, non-stop, gory action, Queen of Blood is the book for you. If you prefer suggestive prose, that lets you fill in the blanks yourself, and a little more character development, you might want to avoid it. If you're somewhere in the middle, this book will alternately thrill and irk you. Ultimately, you keep flipping the pages to see what's coming next, so, overall, Smith has done his job.