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The Vampire Tapestry
Edward Weyland is far from your average vampire: not only is he a respected anthropology professor but his condition is biological — rather than supernatural. He lives discrete lifetimes bounded by decades of hibernation and steals blood from labs rather than committing murder. Weyland is a monster who must form an uneasy empathy with his prey in order to survive, and The Vampire Tapestry is a story wholly unlike any you've heard before.
285 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1980
About the author
Suzy McKee Charnas
78 books101 followersSuzy McKee Charnas, a native New Yorker raised and educated in Manhattan, surfaced as an author with WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD (1974), a no-punches-pulled feminist SF novel and Campbell award finalist. The three further books that sprang from WALK (comprising a futurist, feminist epic about how people make history and create myth) closed in 1999 with THE CONQUEROR’S CHILD, a Tiptree winner (as is the series in its entirety).
Meanwhile, she taught for two years in Nigeria with the Peace Corps, married, and moved to New Mexico, where she has lived, taught, and written fiction and non-fiction for forty five years. She teaches SF from time to time, and travels every year to genre conventions around the country and (occasionally) around the world.
Her varied SF and fantasy works have also won the Hugo award, the Nebula award, the Gigamesh Award (Spain), and the Mythopoeic award for Young-Adult fantasy. A play based on her novel THE VAMPIRE TAPESTRY has been staged on both coasts. STAGESTRUCK VAMPIRES (Tachyon Books) collects her best short fiction, plus essays on writing feminist SF and on seeing her play script first become a professionally staged drama in San Francisco. Currently, she’s working at getting all of her work out in e-book, audio, and other formats, and moving several decades’ worth of manuscripts, correspondence, etc. out of a slightly leaky garage and sent off to be archived at the University of Oregon Special Collections. She has two cats and a gentleman boarder (also a cat), good friends and colleagues, ideas for new work, and travel plans for the future.
Meanwhile, she taught for two years in Nigeria with the Peace Corps, married, and moved to New Mexico, where she has lived, taught, and written fiction and non-fiction for forty five years. She teaches SF from time to time, and travels every year to genre conventions around the country and (occasionally) around the world.
Her varied SF and fantasy works have also won the Hugo award, the Nebula award, the Gigamesh Award (Spain), and the Mythopoeic award for Young-Adult fantasy. A play based on her novel THE VAMPIRE TAPESTRY has been staged on both coasts. STAGESTRUCK VAMPIRES (Tachyon Books) collects her best short fiction, plus essays on writing feminist SF and on seeing her play script first become a professionally staged drama in San Francisco. Currently, she’s working at getting all of her work out in e-book, audio, and other formats, and moving several decades’ worth of manuscripts, correspondence, etc. out of a slightly leaky garage and sent off to be archived at the University of Oregon Special Collections. She has two cats and a gentleman boarder (also a cat), good friends and colleagues, ideas for new work, and travel plans for the future.
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September 21, 2019
“The corporeal vampire, if he existed, would be by definition the greatest of all predators, living as he would off the top of the food chain.”
Dr. Edward Weyland, professor of Anthropology, is conducting a sleep study as part of his teaching program. It is very popular with the students, especially those who need the extra cash. They even start wearing t-shirts…Sleep with Weyland. He’s a dream.
Charnas’s creature Dr. Edward Weyland.
He is irresistible.
”Just look at him, so haggard and preoccupied, so lean and lonely-looking. The man deserved a prize for his solitary-bachelor-hopelessly-hooked-on-the-pursuit-of-knowledge act.”
I love that look. I’ve cultivated it myself a few times. Women love it, and men always feel a sprig of jealousy bloom. They know a well designed script when they see it. Weyland is a bit of a connoisseur. He has plenty of students signing up for his program, but there are certain people whom he wants in his program. A Mrs. de Groot, a widow of a professor, is working as many hours as she can to save up enough money to go back to South Africa. She is one of those people who has proved elusive to his charms.
Mrs. de Groot is a woman who was raised in the wilds of Africa. She understands animals and their urges, and something about Weyland raises the hackles on the back of her neck.
Of course, Weyland isn’t interested in a sleep study. It is a cover for his pursuit for blood. Humans are just cattle, annoying livestock who chatter too much and are so demanding of him for attention and affirmation. The women want to sleep with him more than they want to sleep for him, and he has no desire to mate with his livestock.
Gross, right?
But in some cases, he does. If one proves to be an especially tasty treat, he can perform the deed to keep her sweet blood near and dear.
It has been too easy for him, and he has lost a bit of his edge. His instincts should have told him that de Groot is more trouble than she is worth.
We next see Weyland seeking psychological help from a brilliant psychotherapist named Floria Landauer. He is trying to convince her that everything is fine with him so he can go back to work at the university after...the...erhhh...mishap.
Something about her makes him honest with her. More importantly, she believes him. They explore the concept of his vampirism in a way that he has never considered before. It is a dangerous game she is playing, and she knows she has had a deeper impact on him than even Weyland is willing to admit. ”But think of me sometimes, Weyland, thinking of you.”
It proves way too hot on the East Coast, so Weyland heads West and lands in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with another University gig. He has the role mastered, and he has to admit he loves the lifestyle that comes with it, not to mention the plethora of young people with such tasty unpolluted blood.
Things go sideways again, as they tend to do. Humans are so unpredictable and so caught up in themselves that they have no consideration for how their actions will effect a vampire just trying to take a sip or two of the gallons and gallons of red corpuscles that are such an abundant natural resource.
Through all of this, he has to keep a wary eye over his back shoulder for a cult that is intent on making a religion out of him.
I couldn’t help but like Edward Weyland. He is ruthless, but calculating. He enjoys the finer things in life, which is also why he likes a high profile professor’s gig to something actually safer, like a fry cook or a ticket salesman at a drive-in movie theater. Through his eyes, we also get to look at ourselves and see how ludicrous we must seem to alien creatures. We have been at the top of the food chain for a long time, and certainly most of us have lost our edge, our instincts, even in some cases the ability to listen to our own natural protection grid of senses that are hardwired into us to keep us safe. For most of us, danger is an abstract thought. How different would our lives be if there were a creature who could leapfrog us in the food chain and push us down to number two?
Life would taste different.
Priorities would shift.
Those things taken for granted would become precious once again.
This is not your ordinary, bared teeth, blood splattering, sexy vampire book. There is a good reason why Centipede Press has recently decided to print a beautiful, limited, signed edition of this 1980 classic of the genre. Weyland will weigh on your mind long after you’ve turned the final page.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
Dr. Edward Weyland, professor of Anthropology, is conducting a sleep study as part of his teaching program. It is very popular with the students, especially those who need the extra cash. They even start wearing t-shirts…Sleep with Weyland. He’s a dream.
Charnas’s creature Dr. Edward Weyland.
He is irresistible.
”Just look at him, so haggard and preoccupied, so lean and lonely-looking. The man deserved a prize for his solitary-bachelor-hopelessly-hooked-on-the-pursuit-of-knowledge act.”
I love that look. I’ve cultivated it myself a few times. Women love it, and men always feel a sprig of jealousy bloom. They know a well designed script when they see it. Weyland is a bit of a connoisseur. He has plenty of students signing up for his program, but there are certain people whom he wants in his program. A Mrs. de Groot, a widow of a professor, is working as many hours as she can to save up enough money to go back to South Africa. She is one of those people who has proved elusive to his charms.
Mrs. de Groot is a woman who was raised in the wilds of Africa. She understands animals and their urges, and something about Weyland raises the hackles on the back of her neck.
Of course, Weyland isn’t interested in a sleep study. It is a cover for his pursuit for blood. Humans are just cattle, annoying livestock who chatter too much and are so demanding of him for attention and affirmation. The women want to sleep with him more than they want to sleep for him, and he has no desire to mate with his livestock.
Gross, right?
But in some cases, he does. If one proves to be an especially tasty treat, he can perform the deed to keep her sweet blood near and dear.
It has been too easy for him, and he has lost a bit of his edge. His instincts should have told him that de Groot is more trouble than she is worth.
We next see Weyland seeking psychological help from a brilliant psychotherapist named Floria Landauer. He is trying to convince her that everything is fine with him so he can go back to work at the university after...the...erhhh...mishap.
Something about her makes him honest with her. More importantly, she believes him. They explore the concept of his vampirism in a way that he has never considered before. It is a dangerous game she is playing, and she knows she has had a deeper impact on him than even Weyland is willing to admit. ”But think of me sometimes, Weyland, thinking of you.”
It proves way too hot on the East Coast, so Weyland heads West and lands in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with another University gig. He has the role mastered, and he has to admit he loves the lifestyle that comes with it, not to mention the plethora of young people with such tasty unpolluted blood.
Things go sideways again, as they tend to do. Humans are so unpredictable and so caught up in themselves that they have no consideration for how their actions will effect a vampire just trying to take a sip or two of the gallons and gallons of red corpuscles that are such an abundant natural resource.
Through all of this, he has to keep a wary eye over his back shoulder for a cult that is intent on making a religion out of him.
I couldn’t help but like Edward Weyland. He is ruthless, but calculating. He enjoys the finer things in life, which is also why he likes a high profile professor’s gig to something actually safer, like a fry cook or a ticket salesman at a drive-in movie theater. Through his eyes, we also get to look at ourselves and see how ludicrous we must seem to alien creatures. We have been at the top of the food chain for a long time, and certainly most of us have lost our edge, our instincts, even in some cases the ability to listen to our own natural protection grid of senses that are hardwired into us to keep us safe. For most of us, danger is an abstract thought. How different would our lives be if there were a creature who could leapfrog us in the food chain and push us down to number two?
Life would taste different.
Priorities would shift.
Those things taken for granted would become precious once again.
This is not your ordinary, bared teeth, blood splattering, sexy vampire book. There is a good reason why Centipede Press has recently decided to print a beautiful, limited, signed edition of this 1980 classic of the genre. Weyland will weigh on your mind long after you’ve turned the final page.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
June 24, 2013
The Vampire Tapestry is unlike any book I have yet read or expect to read. I owe a debt of thanks to Book People in Austin, Texas, for displaying it prominently above a glowing staff review, thus mining this gem from its relative and wholly undeserved obscurity. Suzy McKee Charnas has gifted us with the most credible vampire in the entire canon, a creature that would be more at home in The Scientific American than Weird Tales. We see Dr. Edward Weyland through the eyes of various satellite characters in a brilliantly weighted quintet of short stories that might be called chapters (or the reverse)-the characters we discover are diverse and very real. We meet cowards, hunters, sadists, therapists, love-starved grad students and an artist who has trained her eye to see beyond the visible. If this story lacks a hero, it delivers a blameless anti-hero, sympathetic, three-dimensional and endlessly fascinating. The narrative plays a deceptively large game, wrestling with questions about the nature of humanity, the value of life and the relationship between predator and prey. Read this book.
May 12, 2012
Ugh. Got to the part where the main character starts to blame the victim for being raped on campus by saying "no real woman" would let that happen to her and got so disgusted I couldn't finish. This followed by her saying another character was all but a bleeding hippy for wanting to save the ozone layer and then she slips into some weird fantasy right after where she's remembering hunting endangered big cats in Africa during her youth. I think I'll take my vampire novels without Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS thank you very much.
Want to read
January 10, 2017This is copy 40 of 150 signed and numbered copies signed by Suzy McKee Charnas, Nancy Baker, Benjamin Mowak, Jeffrey Allan Love
March 9, 2017
So this book is divided into 5 novellas, some with ludicrous names.
I'll review them one by one if I get through them all... There may be mild spoilers...
The ancient mind at work:
Well... The protagonist was really annoying. As other reviewers have noted she has a ridiculous world view. There's a serial rapist loose on campus, her thoughts are: Women with sense don't get raped.
She's South African and has this weird race thing going on, where she randomly trusts black people, but spends a lot of time thinking to herself that she doesn't know how to talk to them or deal with them.
Why did I keep reading? Because it's OK to have an annoying protagonist that has fucked up world views, it doesn't necessarily mean anything other than that. But I also read on because of the ludicrous way she discovers the vampire is a vampire, it's in the first few pages so no spoilers:
She sees him walk by a student who is hunched over on the ground possibly because of pain or maybe extreme fatigue after a session at the vampires sleep lab. He just walks straight past him and gets in his car and drives away. He just doesn't care. Monstrous. She even goes over in her head that maybe he just thought that the student was bending down to pick up something. But deep down in her gut, because of this one shocking incident, she knows he's a vampire....
I could have accepted it if the author had used the angle that she was a hunter back in Africa, which we are told later on, if it had been something like a predator recognises another predator type thing... but no.
Later she attends a lecture he's holding about nightmares. A students asks something about werewolves and then the vampire starts lecturing about vampires and basically has a whole class on his own mythology. Nice and handy. He just shares all his secrets, like he's been waiting for years for someone to ask him about vampires and then they asked him about werewolves and then he just went Close enough! and carried on with it.
It gets 2 stars for the lols I had reading it.
The land of lost content
Meh. The vampire is trapped after
He has chats with a young teenage boy, he's on spectacle like a zoo animal... it's boring... 1 star would have gotten none if it was in a different rating system...
Unicorn tapestry
Really that's the title? Yes it is.
OK in this novella the vampire has to start in therapy and hilarity ensues... I wish! The vampire starts in therapy and I got bored. This book is like vampire fan fiction in different settings and obviously well before the sparkling ones came out. Even though it's split into novellas it's basically one long musing about vampires in different settings. I'm not even going to give the separate novellas ratings anymore, I'm just going to slug through this. I've come this far!
A musical interlude
So this novella is basically just watching Tosca through the eyes of the vampire, his colleagues and some of the actors... I appreciate that the author is showing us a vampire in different circumstances, but this is just silly. There was way too much telling of Tosca in this novella. It was basically just reading a weird version of Tosca, with annoying interludes from the spectators. I guess the main point was to show some sort of devolution in the vampire, since a character in the last novella is named after a character in Tosca and watching it makes him so incensed that he kills a man in the style he used to use back in the day. But I'd rather just watch Tosca to be honest.
The last of Dr. Weyland
He realises that human aren't just cattle... Dr. Weyland is an arrogant asshole and now I don't ever have to read about him again! Yay!
I'll review them one by one if I get through them all... There may be mild spoilers...
The ancient mind at work:
Well... The protagonist was really annoying. As other reviewers have noted she has a ridiculous world view. There's a serial rapist loose on campus, her thoughts are: Women with sense don't get raped.
She's South African and has this weird race thing going on, where she randomly trusts black people, but spends a lot of time thinking to herself that she doesn't know how to talk to them or deal with them.
Why did I keep reading? Because it's OK to have an annoying protagonist that has fucked up world views, it doesn't necessarily mean anything other than that. But I also read on because of the ludicrous way she discovers the vampire is a vampire, it's in the first few pages so no spoilers:
She sees him walk by a student who is hunched over on the ground possibly because of pain or maybe extreme fatigue after a session at the vampires sleep lab. He just walks straight past him and gets in his car and drives away. He just doesn't care. Monstrous. She even goes over in her head that maybe he just thought that the student was bending down to pick up something. But deep down in her gut, because of this one shocking incident, she knows he's a vampire....
I could have accepted it if the author had used the angle that she was a hunter back in Africa, which we are told later on, if it had been something like a predator recognises another predator type thing... but no.
Later she attends a lecture he's holding about nightmares. A students asks something about werewolves and then the vampire starts lecturing about vampires and basically has a whole class on his own mythology. Nice and handy. He just shares all his secrets, like he's been waiting for years for someone to ask him about vampires and then they asked him about werewolves and then he just went Close enough! and carried on with it.
It gets 2 stars for the lols I had reading it.
The land of lost content
Meh. The vampire is trapped after
He has chats with a young teenage boy, he's on spectacle like a zoo animal... it's boring... 1 star would have gotten none if it was in a different rating system...
Unicorn tapestry
Really that's the title? Yes it is.
OK in this novella the vampire has to start in therapy and hilarity ensues... I wish! The vampire starts in therapy and I got bored. This book is like vampire fan fiction in different settings and obviously well before the sparkling ones came out. Even though it's split into novellas it's basically one long musing about vampires in different settings. I'm not even going to give the separate novellas ratings anymore, I'm just going to slug through this. I've come this far!
A musical interlude
So this novella is basically just watching Tosca through the eyes of the vampire, his colleagues and some of the actors... I appreciate that the author is showing us a vampire in different circumstances, but this is just silly. There was way too much telling of Tosca in this novella. It was basically just reading a weird version of Tosca, with annoying interludes from the spectators. I guess the main point was to show some sort of devolution in the vampire, since a character in the last novella is named after a character in Tosca and watching it makes him so incensed that he kills a man in the style he used to use back in the day. But I'd rather just watch Tosca to be honest.
The last of Dr. Weyland
He realises that human aren't just cattle... Dr. Weyland is an arrogant asshole and now I don't ever have to read about him again! Yay!
February 5, 2010
vampires are publishing gold right now, what with the fallout from Twilight, Anita Blake and True Blood. When publishers have a 'vampire Romance' section on their website, you know the purchasing power a literary fad has got to be considerable indeed.
Some folks are ok with chewing through every vampire romance book under the sun in their lust to sake their vamp fixation. If you are one of those people looking for a demon lover/fang banging action, this is NOT the book for you.
The Vampire Tapestry is...dare I say this... a proper novel. What do i mean by that? well, this is not just an enjoyable, titillating narrative with bared bosoms and dark brooding heroes (though of course, those types of books have their time and place!) This is a novel that asks questions- questions about humanity, isolation, empathy and relationships.
Written as a series of short stories based around a central vampire character, this book jumps into the point of view of several very different protagonists in a very realistic way. Written with verve and a dark empathy, you crawl into the skin of people faced with the discovery that not only are vampires real, they are not the sexy dashing figures of popular fiction.
Instead, our vampire is an evolutionary freak, an isolated and territorial creature, capable of many emotions we would recognize, but certainly far from human.
We meet an aging woman, whose encounter with the Vampire brings out all her memories of big game hunting on the african veld.
We meet a child, tormented by the fact the Vampire has been imprisoned by his family, to be used in experiments in dark magic.
We meet a psychologist tasked with removing her patient's Vampire delusion- only to find it is all too real.
Finally, we meet the Vampire himself, struggling with the idea that he has been awake too long, and is infected with humanity in all its wonders and failure.
All in all, excellently written, great concepts- prose gets a little purple in places, but this is very easy to forgive. If you only every buy one Vampire book, make it this one.
Some folks are ok with chewing through every vampire romance book under the sun in their lust to sake their vamp fixation. If you are one of those people looking for a demon lover/fang banging action, this is NOT the book for you.
The Vampire Tapestry is...dare I say this... a proper novel. What do i mean by that? well, this is not just an enjoyable, titillating narrative with bared bosoms and dark brooding heroes (though of course, those types of books have their time and place!) This is a novel that asks questions- questions about humanity, isolation, empathy and relationships.
Written as a series of short stories based around a central vampire character, this book jumps into the point of view of several very different protagonists in a very realistic way. Written with verve and a dark empathy, you crawl into the skin of people faced with the discovery that not only are vampires real, they are not the sexy dashing figures of popular fiction.
Instead, our vampire is an evolutionary freak, an isolated and territorial creature, capable of many emotions we would recognize, but certainly far from human.
We meet an aging woman, whose encounter with the Vampire brings out all her memories of big game hunting on the african veld.
We meet a child, tormented by the fact the Vampire has been imprisoned by his family, to be used in experiments in dark magic.
We meet a psychologist tasked with removing her patient's Vampire delusion- only to find it is all too real.
Finally, we meet the Vampire himself, struggling with the idea that he has been awake too long, and is infected with humanity in all its wonders and failure.
All in all, excellently written, great concepts- prose gets a little purple in places, but this is very easy to forgive. If you only every buy one Vampire book, make it this one.
August 15, 2015
I've read this book @ least 3 times, and imagine I will read it again a few more times before I shuffle off this mortal coil. Weyland is, I think, the quintessential vampire. He is other, he is alien, he is the ultimate predator. He is not romantic, emotion plays no part in his existence, he is by no means human, he views humans as sustenance, and he is singular. There is no sentimentality or sympathy in him, he is the ultimate predator and an encounter with him will most often end badly for those humans who get close, with the notable exception of his therapist. I find my mind returning to the connected stories in odd moments, imagining the opera under the stars in Santa Fe as life and death events occur backstage, eclipsing the drama taking place on stage. Suzy McKee Charnas wrote an extraordinary story, seek it out.
October 19, 2008
I had some ambivalence about this book at first, but ultimately came to appreciate it a lot. Ed Weyland is a professor with a difference, he is a bona fide vampire. Weyland is not the supernatural creature of typical sharp-fanged fiction, but a natural if unitary, natural phenomenon. No full moons or holy water in these tales. Weyland is nothing more than a creature with significant physiological differences from humans, a predator living among his prey, stronger, longer-lived, with keener senses. But he is no immortal. He can be killed, and in fact comes close to death.
The book is organized into five tales. In The Ancient Mind at Work, he is foiled by, Katje de Groot, an Afrikaaner widow of a professor at the suburban institute in which he studies sleep. That is the least of the tales. In Land of Lost Content, seriously wounded by the woman he emerges in the hands of Roger and his 13-year old nephew Mark, in Manhattan, where he is held prisoner, starved and exploited by a megalomaniacal dabbler in things mystical, Alan Reese. The Unicorn Tapestry tells of his relationship with Floria, an overworked psychotherapist. This was quite interesting, counterpointing the push-pull he felt about examining himself, and the ambivalence she experienced in attempting to treat him. I liked that one a lot. A Musical Interlude takes Weyland to New Mexico and the strongest of the five tales. It is clear that Charnas is a fan of opera. There is a sensitivity to Weyland that is touched during an intense performance of Tosca. He loses it and dashes off to feed. His internal struggle, in which the need to remain aloof and predatory, and the unwanted sensitivity to human art is wonderfully portrayed, highlighted, maybe a bit over-the-top dramatically by the music of the opera. Finally, The Last of Dr. Weyland was, I think, rather flawed. There is another professor, Irv, across the hall from him. Irv is beloved and tries to engage Weyland. But Weyland maintains his distance. Irv introduces him to two lesbian friends of his, one of who has an uncanny ability to see past the surface. One can sense here a natural nemesis. But Irv, inexplicably, commits suicide. At least that is how it is presented. Fearing the results of a police investigation into Irv’s death, Weyland prepares to leave. But he has been tracked down by the relentless Reese.
I found the final chapter disappointing, although it is far richer than the above synopsis allows. Weyland is an interesting character with interesting perceptions and issues. Charnas has things to say about art, academe and human relationships. I would be interested in seeing what else she produced.
The book is organized into five tales. In The Ancient Mind at Work, he is foiled by, Katje de Groot, an Afrikaaner widow of a professor at the suburban institute in which he studies sleep. That is the least of the tales. In Land of Lost Content, seriously wounded by the woman he emerges in the hands of Roger and his 13-year old nephew Mark, in Manhattan, where he is held prisoner, starved and exploited by a megalomaniacal dabbler in things mystical, Alan Reese. The Unicorn Tapestry tells of his relationship with Floria, an overworked psychotherapist. This was quite interesting, counterpointing the push-pull he felt about examining himself, and the ambivalence she experienced in attempting to treat him. I liked that one a lot. A Musical Interlude takes Weyland to New Mexico and the strongest of the five tales. It is clear that Charnas is a fan of opera. There is a sensitivity to Weyland that is touched during an intense performance of Tosca. He loses it and dashes off to feed. His internal struggle, in which the need to remain aloof and predatory, and the unwanted sensitivity to human art is wonderfully portrayed, highlighted, maybe a bit over-the-top dramatically by the music of the opera. Finally, The Last of Dr. Weyland was, I think, rather flawed. There is another professor, Irv, across the hall from him. Irv is beloved and tries to engage Weyland. But Weyland maintains his distance. Irv introduces him to two lesbian friends of his, one of who has an uncanny ability to see past the surface. One can sense here a natural nemesis. But Irv, inexplicably, commits suicide. At least that is how it is presented. Fearing the results of a police investigation into Irv’s death, Weyland prepares to leave. But he has been tracked down by the relentless Reese.
I found the final chapter disappointing, although it is far richer than the above synopsis allows. Weyland is an interesting character with interesting perceptions and issues. Charnas has things to say about art, academe and human relationships. I would be interested in seeing what else she produced.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 13, 2011
What an interesting vampire book. I'm not very familiar with the genre (Twilight is my only reference) and The Vampire Tapestry is quite different from the Twilight series. There are five novellas featuring Dr. Edward Lewis Weyland: a tall, suave, gray-haired, slightly stooped vampire. (This book was published in 1980 and due to the name "Edward Lewis" I kept picturing a taller version of Richard Gere from "Pretty Woman"!)
Dr. Weyland scoffs at those who believe vampires have fangs (his method for sucking blood is rather cool, I thought) and he is more destructable than the Cullens but still manages to live for centuries. His palpable disdain for the humans upon which he feeds is realistic yet kept me at a distance from his character. I found it hard to connect to Dr. Weyland's austere personality.
Of the five novellas, the one I liked the best (and the one that won the Nebula Award) is "Unicorn Tapestry", featuring Dr. Weyland in therapy. I give this novella 4 stars . . . it is fascinating to see a vampire come clean about his true nature in therapy. At first the female psychologist thinks he must be delusional but then she begins to wonder if he's really telling the truth, which prompts her colleague to recommend therapy for the psychologist, worried that she's enabling and buying into the delusion. This section ends in a very satisfying (and sexy) way. The only reason I don't give this novella 5 stars is that the psychologist's style seems quite cold to me, like many of the fictional therapists I've read in books or watched in movies (but that's my little pet peeve). I think effective therapists are likely much warmer in real life.
Overall, it's an intellectual read. Besides Dr. Weyland, I grew attached to the characters Katje, Floria, and Irv, and wished their stories were woven throughout the novel. I disliked the extreme detail about the opera Tosca, which I've never seen.
For those vampire lovers out there, I think you will enjoy this book.
Dr. Weyland scoffs at those who believe vampires have fangs (his method for sucking blood is rather cool, I thought) and he is more destructable than the Cullens but still manages to live for centuries. His palpable disdain for the humans upon which he feeds is realistic yet kept me at a distance from his character. I found it hard to connect to Dr. Weyland's austere personality.
Of the five novellas, the one I liked the best (and the one that won the Nebula Award) is "Unicorn Tapestry", featuring Dr. Weyland in therapy. I give this novella 4 stars . . . it is fascinating to see a vampire come clean about his true nature in therapy. At first the female psychologist thinks he must be delusional but then she begins to wonder if he's really telling the truth, which prompts her colleague to recommend therapy for the psychologist, worried that she's enabling and buying into the delusion. This section ends in a very satisfying (and sexy) way. The only reason I don't give this novella 5 stars is that the psychologist's style seems quite cold to me, like many of the fictional therapists I've read in books or watched in movies (but that's my little pet peeve). I think effective therapists are likely much warmer in real life.
Overall, it's an intellectual read. Besides Dr. Weyland, I grew attached to the characters Katje, Floria, and Irv, and wished their stories were woven throughout the novel. I disliked the extreme detail about the opera Tosca, which I've never seen.
For those vampire lovers out there, I think you will enjoy this book.
February 15, 2019
I am not really sure what to think about this book. It really is a tapestry of short stories that make up the whole. Each chapter is an individual story of Dr. Weyland with a different set of characters and situations in one short period of his long life. Each chapter makes up the whole story with a beginning, middle and end but some of the stories just aren’t as interesting as the others. This is not your typical vampire horror book with lots of gore and no stereotypical tropes (well, maybe just two or three main ones). It seems to be more of an intellectual vampire story versus a straight up horror novel. If you like your vampires to be scary, lots of gore, lots of action and lots of suspense then you probably won’t like this book. If you like books that delve more into social commentary and are more literary fiction than this books might be for you.
October 6, 2021
I thought this was a very beautifully written book. This book was mentioned in another book I was reading and I finally decided to give it a try. I really enjoyed how the vampire in this one was not the "traditional" or stereotypical vampire one might find in other stories. Also the vampire in this one did not sparkle so that's always a huge plus in my opinion. The imagery the author created here was radiant. I truly savored her style of writing. I had not read anything by this author before. I definitely look forward to reading more by her in the future.
February 3, 2019
i did not finish this book.
August 26, 2016
-Otra forma de acercarse al mito, muy diferente a lo más habitual.-
Género. Narrativa Fantástica (o ciencia ficción, o novela con un punto de partida fantástico, según se vea).
Lo que nos cuenta. Edward Weyland es un maduro y brillante antropólogo de la Universidad de Cayslin, pero también es un vampiro, un depredador que se alimenta de sangre pero cuyas capacidades no se corresponden a las del ser mítico. Aunque ha construido una fachada de normalidad para esconderse en la sociedad y entre sus presas, corre riesgos que lo ponen todo en peligro.
¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:
https://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com...
Género. Narrativa Fantástica (o ciencia ficción, o novela con un punto de partida fantástico, según se vea).
Lo que nos cuenta. Edward Weyland es un maduro y brillante antropólogo de la Universidad de Cayslin, pero también es un vampiro, un depredador que se alimenta de sangre pero cuyas capacidades no se corresponden a las del ser mítico. Aunque ha construido una fachada de normalidad para esconderse en la sociedad y entre sus presas, corre riesgos que lo ponen todo en peligro.
¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:
https://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com...
August 21, 2018
Historias independientes con el mismo protagonista, un vampiro profesor de universidad. Todos los relatos están relacionados y siguen una línea temporal. En cada uno pasara bueno y malos momentos el vampiro. Muy pesados todos ellos, falta de entretenimiento palomitero y exceso de interiorizar el sufrimiento de alguien diferente.
December 4, 2019
No es un secreto para nadie que me conozca que la literatura de este género me atrae, pero este libro sencillamente me ha encantado, más que nada por la presentación tan precisa de lo que YO considero un vampiro. Todo en la suma de historias (porque en realidad estamos ante varios cuentos donde el protagonista es nuestro Sr. Weyland) gira alrededor de él, de su visión, de su filosofía, de sus necesidades, de su desaprensión que es tan palpable que a mi gusto nos regala el espécimen vampiro mejor retratado de la literatura.
Narrativamente hablando creo que la secuencia de cuentos no tan cortos termina siendo un plus ya que le da más fuerza a los episodios y permiten "construir" un todo en que más allá de las perspectivas de cada historia particular, está la esencia de depredador que se dibuja con una pluma experta.
Narrativamente hablando creo que la secuencia de cuentos no tan cortos termina siendo un plus ya que le da más fuerza a los episodios y permiten "construir" un todo en que más allá de las perspectivas de cada historia particular, está la esencia de depredador que se dibuja con una pluma experta.
August 12, 2011
Our hunt for new series to read is ongoing and often on our blogs, or the podcast we request new titles. We are especially looking for books that are progressive and have good representations of marginalized people. Because all of our blogs are social justice related we have a tendency to trust the recommendations. The following is the recommendation that we received for the Vampire Tapestry
“I also recommend The Vampire Tapestry by Suzy McKee Charnas for vampire fiction fans. I read it years ago but it's a very interesting take on the Vampire mythos with just scary good, brilliant writting..”
We need to thank you. Up to this point we were forced to constantly refer to Charlaine Harris’ Aurora Teagarden series as our example as the most fail possible. It was awkward, because we were constantly referring to a book outside the genre and justifying it based in Harris’ urban fantasy series. But no more, now we have a book that is worse than Teagarden – a book within the genre that sets a new limit for awful. So, thank you.
I’m sorry, this review does descend into a lot of snark - but oh gods this book was PAINFUL. Honestly, we got through this only by emailing each other in snarky glee. This is also why this review is a collaborative effort. I warn for MILD spoilers but not many.
Read More
“I also recommend The Vampire Tapestry by Suzy McKee Charnas for vampire fiction fans. I read it years ago but it's a very interesting take on the Vampire mythos with just scary good, brilliant writting..”
We need to thank you. Up to this point we were forced to constantly refer to Charlaine Harris’ Aurora Teagarden series as our example as the most fail possible. It was awkward, because we were constantly referring to a book outside the genre and justifying it based in Harris’ urban fantasy series. But no more, now we have a book that is worse than Teagarden – a book within the genre that sets a new limit for awful. So, thank you.
I’m sorry, this review does descend into a lot of snark - but oh gods this book was PAINFUL. Honestly, we got through this only by emailing each other in snarky glee. This is also why this review is a collaborative effort. I warn for MILD spoilers but not many.
Read More
January 7, 2009
Despite the "Scary" endorsement from Stephen King on the front cover, this wasn't, really. And despite the title and the presence of a human-shaped blood-drinker, it really wasn't about vampires. More a stately exploration of questions like, What does it mean to be human? What is Art and why/how does it affect the observer, human or otherwise? What does it mean to be a predator? To have/want/use power?
Oddly, this make me think about The Sparrow, which is really nothing like this except possibly in some meta-sense, and is much better.
Oddly, this make me think about The Sparrow, which is really nothing like this except possibly in some meta-sense, and is much better.
November 20, 2017
Un vampiro diverso, storia interessante. Avrebbe dovuto essere bellissimo, purtroppo manca qualcosa.
La lettura procede lenta, salto diversi paragrafi, i dialoghi annoiano.
Peccato.
La lettura procede lenta, salto diversi paragrafi, i dialoghi annoiano.
Peccato.
March 27, 2019
I’d never heard of this vampire novel before I was given a copy for my birthday. The blurb describes a vampire academic which, frankly, is enough to interest me. ‘The Vampire Tapestry’ is certainly a original and distinctive take on the vampire genre. The narrative is episodic in structure and each extended chapter focuses on a human being who has a significant impact on Weyland, the vampire. There are five chapters and I found that their appeal was concentrated in the centre. The first and last chapters are the least interesting and unusual, while the third is rather fascinating. In this central chapter, Weyland has therapy with a psychiatrist who comes to realise that his vampirism is not a delusion, yet carries on treating him nonetheless. The whole book is essentially about the psychology of being a solitary vampire, a predator of humans that lives among them camouflaged as one. Weyland is ambivalent to hostile towards humanity and unsettled by any effects that their artistic endeavours have upon him. He is also an anthropology professor, which I found wonderfully ironic. This was bitterly amusing: '“Fat times in academe are over. [...] Every sensible graduate student sees the writing on the wall,” Alison continued. “PhD and all, I’ll wind up typing in an insurance office.”' This novel was first published in 1980; academia in the 21st century is certainly no place for a vampire. Weyland would absolutely hate the relentless barrage of emails from students.
Although I found the therapy sequence the most compelling, I should also mention the entire chapter devoted to a night at the opera. The main character in that is not the vampire but the opera itself, Tosca, performed in an extraordinary outdoor arena. Charnas certainly evokes the electric atmosphere of the theatre beautifully. Weyland gives the impression of being a highbrow fellow, as the sophistication of the opera contrasts with the tawdry trappings of a shady satanist cabal in chapter two. Descriptions of Weyland make him seem very much like Mads Mikkelson playing Hannibal Lecter, with Floria as his Bedelia du Maurier. Honestly, this mental image made the novel more fun. It is largely lacking in humour and has minimal plot, so the enjoyment is to be found in atmosphere and psychological speculation. I suspect that several friends who are particularly fond of vampires might appreciate it more than I did.
EDIT: Looking at the back cover, I just noticed that Charnas won the Nebula award for the middle chapter, which would explain why it stands out as the highlight of the book. I can imagine it being more powerful if read as a standalone short story.
Although I found the therapy sequence the most compelling, I should also mention the entire chapter devoted to a night at the opera. The main character in that is not the vampire but the opera itself, Tosca, performed in an extraordinary outdoor arena. Charnas certainly evokes the electric atmosphere of the theatre beautifully. Weyland gives the impression of being a highbrow fellow, as the sophistication of the opera contrasts with the tawdry trappings of a shady satanist cabal in chapter two. Descriptions of Weyland make him seem very much like Mads Mikkelson playing Hannibal Lecter, with Floria as his Bedelia du Maurier. Honestly, this mental image made the novel more fun. It is largely lacking in humour and has minimal plot, so the enjoyment is to be found in atmosphere and psychological speculation. I suspect that several friends who are particularly fond of vampires might appreciate it more than I did.
EDIT: Looking at the back cover, I just noticed that Charnas won the Nebula award for the middle chapter, which would explain why it stands out as the highlight of the book. I can imagine it being more powerful if read as a standalone short story.
March 21, 2012
Another one of those books I purchased years ago and then forgot about... Reading everywhere what a great book this is, I finally picked it up for reading with high hopes. Unfortunately, this book did not meet my expectations, though I really wanted to like it.
The story consists of several episodes in the life of Edward Weyland, Vampire. Dr. Weyland is not your usual vampire, for once missing the expected vampire teeth and instead feeding through a needle-like tube protruding from his tongue. And, contrary to most vampire fiction, he seems to be the only one of his kind. A natural abomination or mutation, maybe an alien? The origins are never explained, and can't be explained, as the vampire looses all memory of his former "lives" during periodical years of dormancy. The only thing he sort of remembers are his instincts and skills to survive. However, within each waking period he must quickly adapt to his new surroundings and the changes in human life in order to survive.
This time, Weyland leads the relatively comfortable life of a university professor. The calm is disturbed only when a woman working on campus reveals his true identity and decides to put an end to his existence. From now on, Weyland meets several people who have more impact on his life, thoughts and feelings than he ever thought possible, until then regarding people simply as livestock and source of nourishment.
I really liked the extraordinary premise of the book and what a wonderfully different kind of vampire the author has created. Slowly developing human characteristics and therefore, in his own eyes, shortcomings, the predator starts resembling his prey, feeling and caring for other people.
However, reading the book was totally boring for several long passages. I can't put my finger on it, but I could not enjoy the writing and for the most time I was counting pages. At least I got a connection with the story during the last 20 pages, which summed things up nicely and provided a small reconciliation.
I can't remember another book which left me with such opposed feelings, both loving (concept) and hating (realization) the book at the same time.
The story consists of several episodes in the life of Edward Weyland, Vampire. Dr. Weyland is not your usual vampire, for once missing the expected vampire teeth and instead feeding through a needle-like tube protruding from his tongue. And, contrary to most vampire fiction, he seems to be the only one of his kind. A natural abomination or mutation, maybe an alien? The origins are never explained, and can't be explained, as the vampire looses all memory of his former "lives" during periodical years of dormancy. The only thing he sort of remembers are his instincts and skills to survive. However, within each waking period he must quickly adapt to his new surroundings and the changes in human life in order to survive.
This time, Weyland leads the relatively comfortable life of a university professor. The calm is disturbed only when a woman working on campus reveals his true identity and decides to put an end to his existence. From now on, Weyland meets several people who have more impact on his life, thoughts and feelings than he ever thought possible, until then regarding people simply as livestock and source of nourishment.
I really liked the extraordinary premise of the book and what a wonderfully different kind of vampire the author has created. Slowly developing human characteristics and therefore, in his own eyes, shortcomings, the predator starts resembling his prey, feeling and caring for other people.
However, reading the book was totally boring for several long passages. I can't put my finger on it, but I could not enjoy the writing and for the most time I was counting pages. At least I got a connection with the story during the last 20 pages, which summed things up nicely and provided a small reconciliation.
I can't remember another book which left me with such opposed feelings, both loving (concept) and hating (realization) the book at the same time.
January 24, 2019
I'm not sure what I was expecting with this but it's definitely not what I got.
This is not a complete story as such but a sequence of linked short stories about the same vampire. The stories aren't bad but they aren't really offering much new either, the vampire character throughout most of them is not the view we are offered and so we only see snatches of his character that the other characters observe. It's nice in the final story to see things from the vampires perspective and see a bit more clearly into Weyland's life, don't expect revelations and secrets as actually he's not that interesting a character.
The style of vampire in the story reminded me a bit of that from Fevre dream, they are a different species of human and as such hide in plain sight but can't infect others because that's not how vampirism works in this world just in stories. I say Vampires plural loosely as according to the main character he knows of no other vampires and his story of giving blood to turn someone just seemed a ruse to prey on someones pre-conceived notions.
It's not that this is a bad book it's just not that enthralling, the whole opera story told me more about the story of the opera being watched than about the book I was reading and the other chapters while not quite so off track just seemed like treading water for some big event that didn't really happen. I was left at the end feeling very 'Meh' and that was about it.
This is not a complete story as such but a sequence of linked short stories about the same vampire. The stories aren't bad but they aren't really offering much new either, the vampire character throughout most of them is not the view we are offered and so we only see snatches of his character that the other characters observe. It's nice in the final story to see things from the vampires perspective and see a bit more clearly into Weyland's life, don't expect revelations and secrets as actually he's not that interesting a character.
The style of vampire in the story reminded me a bit of that from Fevre dream, they are a different species of human and as such hide in plain sight but can't infect others because that's not how vampirism works in this world just in stories. I say Vampires plural loosely as according to the main character he knows of no other vampires and his story of giving blood to turn someone just seemed a ruse to prey on someones pre-conceived notions.
It's not that this is a bad book it's just not that enthralling, the whole opera story told me more about the story of the opera being watched than about the book I was reading and the other chapters while not quite so off track just seemed like treading water for some big event that didn't really happen. I was left at the end feeling very 'Meh' and that was about it.
August 3, 2011
Charnas is a capable writer but this book really, really SUCKED. I read about 3/4 of it and I just couldn't bear to read anymore. I can't imagine how anyone could take a vampire and make him so completely and unbearably dull. This vampire didn't even have fangs-he had a probiscus under his tongue and used his tongue to suck blood from arms. The vampire was older and ran a sleep-study program at a university which was profoundly fitting since he put me to sleep every time I tried to read about him. In the begining, I tried to keep an open mind and accept that this wasn't a typical take on the average vampire tale. I kept thinking that eventually the story would get better, more interesting. It didn't happen and I abandoned the book altogether.
February 14, 2019
I've read a lot of vampire fiction, and out of the pack, this strange and vicious book holds a distinguished place. It is certainly very compelling - the prose flowed easily, the dialog has an intelligence to it that's neither forced nor facile, and the author can paint scenes vividly.
I do have a problem with the Dr. Weyland character. I know that with each generational hibernation he forgets all the previous lives he's led, and maybe that's an evolutionary advantage, since as he surmised such memories would only be a burden to him. But he also has an instinctive grasp of the lessons that he learned from his past (forgotten) existences, and those continue to serve him in good stead until this very day. Because of this and through the author's manifold descriptions, one gets the impression that he should be wise or, at the very least, shrewd.
However, I have a hard time believing that he is the apex predator he thinks he is. I mean he's certainly a formidable physical specimen, and his prodigious strength and agility does remind one of the great cats, as the stories eloquently describe. But he lets his primal instincts overrule his thinking, and for a hunter who's after intelligent prey, this is a huge no-no. A single mistake can be costly not just to his way of life but to his very existence. He kept making these bone-headed mistakes that were rather appalling.
I can forgive and maybe even admire megalomanic qualities in a vampiric predator, but he must have the situational cunning and strategic/tactical brainpower to back it up. Otherwise he just seems like a puffed up tiger old beyond his years - still majestic and powerful yes, but not extremely difficult to catch or even kill. A Bengal in a zoo can be a striking sight, but in the end it is rather pitiful.
I found Weyland very hard to like because behind his arrogance and contempt, he has blind spots the size of Saturn. I can't believe that he was able to survive for centuries if he's this dense. He really should thank his immense supranatural and physical capacities. I surmise, though, that maybe this is precisely what the author wanted to paint. There are boatloads of sociopathic malignant narcissists in positions of power who can be charming, intelligent, and strong, and who are eventually undone by their own hubris. As the Good Book says: "Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall". If this is so, then I can't help but admire Ms. Yarbro's skill as an astute painter of character.
She definitely knows how to pull the strings of her audience. If at first she lulls you with a false sense of empathy with Weyland slowly coming to terms with his more human qualities, she eventually leads you to a complete 180-degree turn by revealing him as he truly is - a purely amoral monster who doesn't care about the lives he destroys as long as he can nurture his hungers in anonymity. You get a sense of how his existence barely contributes to human society, of how he is indeed a bane to it, a self-indulgent parasite that must be destroyed.
The running theme of the book is the murderous dance between the predator and the prey - how the waltz seemingly proceeds to perfection until a discordant note turns the tables on the aggressor and makes him the victim of the other party. Or it may proceed as intended, similar to the way that the author crafted these tales as akin to a hunting sequence. When I realized this, I thought of how brazen this all is - with the author slowly and inexorably setting up the reader in the role of the victim through a carefully-arranged set of stories. This is heady, brilliant stuff, and so very meta.
Again, I love how the plot proceeded like an archetypal predation scene, and I won't have it any other way. Ms. Charnas has, after all, woven a truly magnificent vampire tapestry, and one feels like an atypical ending will be too jarring and inconsonant, undermining the beauty and integrity of the whole. Overall, I feel that the book merits an 8.5/10, or 4 rapacious, ravenous stars out of 5.
I do have a problem with the Dr. Weyland character. I know that with each generational hibernation he forgets all the previous lives he's led, and maybe that's an evolutionary advantage, since as he surmised such memories would only be a burden to him. But he also has an instinctive grasp of the lessons that he learned from his past (forgotten) existences, and those continue to serve him in good stead until this very day. Because of this and through the author's manifold descriptions, one gets the impression that he should be wise or, at the very least, shrewd.
However, I have a hard time believing that he is the apex predator he thinks he is. I mean he's certainly a formidable physical specimen, and his prodigious strength and agility does remind one of the great cats, as the stories eloquently describe. But he lets his primal instincts overrule his thinking, and for a hunter who's after intelligent prey, this is a huge no-no. A single mistake can be costly not just to his way of life but to his very existence. He kept making these bone-headed mistakes that were rather appalling.
I can forgive and maybe even admire megalomanic qualities in a vampiric predator, but he must have the situational cunning and strategic/tactical brainpower to back it up. Otherwise he just seems like a puffed up tiger old beyond his years - still majestic and powerful yes, but not extremely difficult to catch or even kill. A Bengal in a zoo can be a striking sight, but in the end it is rather pitiful.
I found Weyland very hard to like because behind his arrogance and contempt, he has blind spots the size of Saturn. I can't believe that he was able to survive for centuries if he's this dense. He really should thank his immense supranatural and physical capacities. I surmise, though, that maybe this is precisely what the author wanted to paint. There are boatloads of sociopathic malignant narcissists in positions of power who can be charming, intelligent, and strong, and who are eventually undone by their own hubris. As the Good Book says: "Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall". If this is so, then I can't help but admire Ms. Yarbro's skill as an astute painter of character.
She definitely knows how to pull the strings of her audience. If at first she lulls you with a false sense of empathy with Weyland slowly coming to terms with his more human qualities, she eventually leads you to a complete 180-degree turn by revealing him as he truly is - a purely amoral monster who doesn't care about the lives he destroys as long as he can nurture his hungers in anonymity. You get a sense of how his existence barely contributes to human society, of how he is indeed a bane to it, a self-indulgent parasite that must be destroyed.
The running theme of the book is the murderous dance between the predator and the prey - how the waltz seemingly proceeds to perfection until a discordant note turns the tables on the aggressor and makes him the victim of the other party. Or it may proceed as intended, similar to the way that the author crafted these tales as akin to a hunting sequence. When I realized this, I thought of how brazen this all is - with the author slowly and inexorably setting up the reader in the role of the victim through a carefully-arranged set of stories. This is heady, brilliant stuff, and so very meta.
Again, I love how the plot proceeded like an archetypal predation scene, and I won't have it any other way. Ms. Charnas has, after all, woven a truly magnificent vampire tapestry, and one feels like an atypical ending will be too jarring and inconsonant, undermining the beauty and integrity of the whole. Overall, I feel that the book merits an 8.5/10, or 4 rapacious, ravenous stars out of 5.
March 11, 2024
Suzy McKee Charnas died in late December 2022. She was a friend, and I edited three of her books professionally. When she died, I wanted to reread something special, and I went for this one, which is probably her best known book.
Edward Weyland is a respected professor ... and a vampire. It was extremely important to Suzy that her vampire not have the ability to convert humans into vampires, because she understood the grains-of-sand-on-a-chessboard math. So he is a solo vampire, extremely long-lived, skilled in the deceptions that let him blend in to humanity through the centuries. In our time (well, some 40 years ago now), on a quiet university campus, he encounters Katje de Groot, a South African woman who understands guns and predators. She recognizes the danger he poses and tries to kill him ("The Ancient Mind at Work").
As a result of his injuries, he winds up as the prisoner of an unscrupulous man with even less scrupulous friends (and an extremely sweet and thoughtful teenage nephew). In this episode, he barely escapes with his life, and is forced to concoct quite a story to return to his job ("The Land of Lost Content").
The story he comes up with sends him into psychotherapy with Dr. Floria Landauer ("The Unicorn Tapestry"). This long meaty tale gives us much of his back story, and also a front-row seat as he reveals perhaps more of himself to Dr. Landauer than he was aware of ... and their relationship develops in unexpected ways.
Able to recreate his professorial persona, he flees to New Mexico, where he has a near-breakdown at a performance of Tosca ("A Musical Interlude"). And then the worst of his captors from a previous story find his trail, and he finds himself forced to leave this time and place altogether ("The Last of Dr. Weyland").
After several decades away, I had forgotten most of the book except for the first story and the psychotherapy story. As always when I read Suzy, I was struck by how intelligent her writing was, and how her characters -- both Weyland himself and the viewpoint characters of the first three sections -- manage to combine intense emotion with the skills to think their way through, or at least to try their best.
If you aren't wedded to traditional vampires, this one is well worth your time, as are Suzy's Holdfast novels and more.
Edward Weyland is a respected professor ... and a vampire. It was extremely important to Suzy that her vampire not have the ability to convert humans into vampires, because she understood the grains-of-sand-on-a-chessboard math. So he is a solo vampire, extremely long-lived, skilled in the deceptions that let him blend in to humanity through the centuries. In our time (well, some 40 years ago now), on a quiet university campus, he encounters Katje de Groot, a South African woman who understands guns and predators. She recognizes the danger he poses and tries to kill him ("The Ancient Mind at Work").
As a result of his injuries, he winds up as the prisoner of an unscrupulous man with even less scrupulous friends (and an extremely sweet and thoughtful teenage nephew). In this episode, he barely escapes with his life, and is forced to concoct quite a story to return to his job ("The Land of Lost Content").
The story he comes up with sends him into psychotherapy with Dr. Floria Landauer ("The Unicorn Tapestry"). This long meaty tale gives us much of his back story, and also a front-row seat as he reveals perhaps more of himself to Dr. Landauer than he was aware of ... and their relationship develops in unexpected ways.
Able to recreate his professorial persona, he flees to New Mexico, where he has a near-breakdown at a performance of Tosca ("A Musical Interlude"). And then the worst of his captors from a previous story find his trail, and he finds himself forced to leave this time and place altogether ("The Last of Dr. Weyland").
After several decades away, I had forgotten most of the book except for the first story and the psychotherapy story. As always when I read Suzy, I was struck by how intelligent her writing was, and how her characters -- both Weyland himself and the viewpoint characters of the first three sections -- manage to combine intense emotion with the skills to think their way through, or at least to try their best.
If you aren't wedded to traditional vampires, this one is well worth your time, as are Suzy's Holdfast novels and more.
April 27, 2017
A compelling take on the vampire novel which rose fairly prominently to some acclaim when it was released back in 1980 and then promptly faded to obscurity.
Allow me to say that I am deeply thankful for Jerad Walters and his Centipede Press, as I never even would have stumbled across this masterpiece without him. And it truly was that, as far as I am concerned. At least within the genre.
Based on the reviews here at Goodreads, this book has not withstood the test of time for many readers. Perhaps they wouldn't have appreciated it 35 years ago either. But I certainly did.
Possibly the most fascinating vampire I have read about, Dr. Edward Weyland is an enticing mix of curious ignorance (the rationale for which is explained brilliantly in the book), aloof otherworldly detachment, urbane demeanor, and predatory instinct. This book, actually a collection of five novellas loosely linked by the main character, covers a remarkably short span of time in the life of a creature that is essentially immortal and provides ruminations on both his curious condition and that of his human cattle at the same time.
Though it did slow a bit in a few places, the writing was tight, lucid, extremely intelligent and viewing this creature through the eyes of the women (and one child) who play pivotal, albeit short, roles in its existence is fascinating.
The fourth 'chapter', however, where the vampire is exposed to Puccini's Tosca for the first time and reacts...surprisingly...elevates the entire work to a new height. It was a sublimely-written, brilliantly-conceived portion of the novel and I read it twice, the second time just so I could enjoy it with the Metropolitan Opera's performance of Tosca on the record player. ;)
Allow me to say that I am deeply thankful for Jerad Walters and his Centipede Press, as I never even would have stumbled across this masterpiece without him. And it truly was that, as far as I am concerned. At least within the genre.
Based on the reviews here at Goodreads, this book has not withstood the test of time for many readers. Perhaps they wouldn't have appreciated it 35 years ago either. But I certainly did.
Possibly the most fascinating vampire I have read about, Dr. Edward Weyland is an enticing mix of curious ignorance (the rationale for which is explained brilliantly in the book), aloof otherworldly detachment, urbane demeanor, and predatory instinct. This book, actually a collection of five novellas loosely linked by the main character, covers a remarkably short span of time in the life of a creature that is essentially immortal and provides ruminations on both his curious condition and that of his human cattle at the same time.
Though it did slow a bit in a few places, the writing was tight, lucid, extremely intelligent and viewing this creature through the eyes of the women (and one child) who play pivotal, albeit short, roles in its existence is fascinating.
The fourth 'chapter', however, where the vampire is exposed to Puccini's Tosca for the first time and reacts...surprisingly...elevates the entire work to a new height. It was a sublimely-written, brilliantly-conceived portion of the novel and I read it twice, the second time just so I could enjoy it with the Metropolitan Opera's performance of Tosca on the record player. ;)
December 28, 2009
I have to say that Ms. Charnas has taken a very clever and new look at the vampire. This isn't at all the Dracula, Anne Rice hero, or any of the brooding young guys on television or the movies. I wasn't immediately engaged in the book, but after a couple of chapters I just gave into the story being told. I accepted the perameters that she had set for her vampire and gave up all other notions. I believe this is what allowed me to become deeply engaged with the book. Her writing is exquisite and the characters are very bold especially Dr. Weyland.
If you are interested in vampires and not just a part of the current fad, then I recommend this book to you as something new and unique to the genre. If you are interested in a great deal of supernatural and superhuman predatory motifs then this isn't the book for you. If you are unable to give up your notions of what a vampire is (biting necks, reading minds, changing into other nightime creatures, or residing in an ancient castle with all the gothic romance available) then this also isn't the book for you. If you are, however, someone that is interested in the vampire character and are willing to forgo conclusions you will get a great deal out of this book then a mere vampire tale.
If you are interested in vampires and not just a part of the current fad, then I recommend this book to you as something new and unique to the genre. If you are interested in a great deal of supernatural and superhuman predatory motifs then this isn't the book for you. If you are unable to give up your notions of what a vampire is (biting necks, reading minds, changing into other nightime creatures, or residing in an ancient castle with all the gothic romance available) then this also isn't the book for you. If you are, however, someone that is interested in the vampire character and are willing to forgo conclusions you will get a great deal out of this book then a mere vampire tale.
October 18, 2019
A shockingly well-written novel, especially for the paperback horror boom era, The Vampire Tapestry has unfortunately fallen into obscurity — and I think that’s a shame.
What one should probably know upfront is this isn’t a “novel” in the conventional sense; it’s five longish stories told in chronological order that portray the reawakening and strange life of our main character, the Vampire. These tales do connect in small and important ways, but the end result is not so much a complete novel but . . . a tapestry.
Also, one should probably know this book isn’t scary, despite what the Stephen King blurb on the front of the ‘81 paperback says. Does a horror book have to be scary? Some say yes, others say no. I don’t care, because the writing herein is at times tragic, and gorgeous, and sensual, and suspenseful. That’s all I need, and more.
I am docking a star because the final two stories lost me a bit, especially “A Musical Interlude”. Not bad stuff, it just didn’t live up to the three stories that preceded it.
Read for ‘Vampires’ in Halloween Bingo.
What one should probably know upfront is this isn’t a “novel” in the conventional sense; it’s five longish stories told in chronological order that portray the reawakening and strange life of our main character, the Vampire. These tales do connect in small and important ways, but the end result is not so much a complete novel but . . . a tapestry.
Also, one should probably know this book isn’t scary, despite what the Stephen King blurb on the front of the ‘81 paperback says. Does a horror book have to be scary? Some say yes, others say no. I don’t care, because the writing herein is at times tragic, and gorgeous, and sensual, and suspenseful. That’s all I need, and more.
I am docking a star because the final two stories lost me a bit, especially “A Musical Interlude”. Not bad stuff, it just didn’t live up to the three stories that preceded it.
Read for ‘Vampires’ in Halloween Bingo.
April 14, 2010
The Vampire Tapestry
is the type of vampire book I'd find prior to all the PNR/UF books out now.
The books consists of five novellas that run chronologically to form a full length novel when read together. The first three are all written from the POV of three people who cross paths with Dr. Edward Weyland and recognize him for what he is, vampire.
The final story is told from Dr. Weyland’s perspective where he realizes the consequences of living too closely with his prey and the effects it has on his existence.
Dr. Weyland is unlike any of the traditional vampires. He's a living being of a different species. He doesn’t know his own origin, but he knows that he has lived for many lifetimes.
This is the story of what happens when his existence is revealed to others.
[Format Read: eBook]
The books consists of five novellas that run chronologically to form a full length novel when read together. The first three are all written from the POV of three people who cross paths with Dr. Edward Weyland and recognize him for what he is, vampire.
The final story is told from Dr. Weyland’s perspective where he realizes the consequences of living too closely with his prey and the effects it has on his existence.
Dr. Weyland is unlike any of the traditional vampires. He's a living being of a different species. He doesn’t know his own origin, but he knows that he has lived for many lifetimes.
This is the story of what happens when his existence is revealed to others.
[Format Read: eBook]
January 25, 2024
Very much of its era (the 1970s, really, for all that it was published in the early 1980s) and that era's specific preoccupations--with therapy, with Satanism, with what it means to be human. Well, the last is a pretty eternal preoccupation, I suppose. I came of age reading 1980s and 1990s vampire novels written by people who almost certainly read this, and so I am well-imprinted to respond well to its quiet, disquieting charms. I am less certain it would speak to someone born twenty years after me.
Some interesting bits of structure: the vampire's viewpoint only emerges in the final two-fifths, as he's slowly corrupted by humanity. Before then, I suppose, his perspective would be too alien to write. Also, I found starting with Katje's perspective a daring choice on Charnas's part--she (with her pro-Apartheid sympathies and at best regressive views on gender) is not a sympathetic human (not to modern eyes, and probably not to Charnas's eyes in the 1970s either), but she is human, being stalked by a vampire, and that puts the reader in an uncomfortable, off-balance place of unwilling sympathy.
Some interesting bits of structure: the vampire's viewpoint only emerges in the final two-fifths, as he's slowly corrupted by humanity. Before then, I suppose, his perspective would be too alien to write. Also, I found starting with Katje's perspective a daring choice on Charnas's part--she (with her pro-Apartheid sympathies and at best regressive views on gender) is not a sympathetic human (not to modern eyes, and probably not to Charnas's eyes in the 1970s either), but she is human, being stalked by a vampire, and that puts the reader in an uncomfortable, off-balance place of unwilling sympathy.
February 6, 2020
Μην πω ψέματα: δεν το τελείωσα το βιβλίο. Μπορεί να το έχω στην κατηγορία "horror", αλλά δεν είναι. Είναι κοινωνικό, όπου ο βρικόλακας ενδύεται τον ρόλο του Άλλου και του Άγριου Ζώου όχι μεταφορικά, αλλά ξεκάθαρα, σαν πείραμα σκέψης. Τι θα γινόταν αν...
Έχει σαφώς μερικές ενδιαφέρουσες ιδέες και επιλογές χαρακτήρων, όπως η καταγόμενη από την πρώην αποικιοκρατούμενη Αφρική Κάτιε ντε Γκρουτ, η οποία έχει έναν βαθιά ριζωμένο αλλά όχι προεξέχοντα ρατσισμό (μεταξύ άλλων). Ήθελε μεγάλες cojones να τολμήσει η συγγραφέας να βάλει μια αφήγηση από την οπτική ενός τέτοιου ανθρώπου. Αναμενόμενα ενόχλησε όσους δεν καταλαβαίνουν τι διαβάζουν ή γιατί, και σε αυτό την παραδέχομαι. Αντίστοιχα ο Μαρκ από το διαλυμένο σπίτι με τον εγκληματία θείο και την πρόωρη, επίπλαστη ενηλικίωση πάνω από την παιδικότητά του και φυσικά τα μοτίβα βιολογικής και ψυχολογικές προσέγγισης / ανάλυσης ενός βριικόλακα.
ΟΜΩΣ...
Το βιβλίο δεν έχει ιστορία. Έχει τα απολύτως ελάχιστα για να κινείται ο χρόνος, όμως πλοκή δεν υπάρχει. Είναι μια σειρά ενατενίσεων πάνω στον βρικόλακα με τον ρόλο που ανέφερα παραπάνω. Επίσης δεν υπάρχει δομή του κόσμου όπου εκτυλίσσεται η δράση: η ντε Γκρουτ παίρνει είδηση τον βρικόλακα απλά επειδή είναι βολικό για το point της συγγραφέα. Δεν υπάρχει άλλος ουσιαστικός λόγος. Το ίδιο οι απαγωγείς του που πιστεύουν πως είναι αυτό που είναι χωρίς κανέναν ιδιαίτερο λόγο. Απλά βολέυει για να περάσουμε στην ενατένιση.
Έπειτα η μαγεία: λειτουργεί, δεν λειτουργεί και γιατί; Υπάρχει το υπερφυσικό στον κόσμο ή ο βρικόλακας είναι απλά μια γενετική ανωμαλία; Όλα αυτά είναι μετέωρα, διότι δεν νοιάζουν τη συγγραφέα. Το πρόβλημα είναι πως ούτε εμένα με ενδιαφέρει να διαβάζω κονωνικούς, ψυχολογικούς και μεταφυσικούς προβληματισμούς ως πρόζα - ή τουλάχιστον, χωρίς να είναι ενταγμένοι σε μια ουσιαστική πλοκή.
Έχει σαφώς μερικές ενδιαφέρουσες ιδέες και επιλογές χαρακτήρων, όπως η καταγόμενη από την πρώην αποικιοκρατούμενη Αφρική Κάτιε ντε Γκρουτ, η οποία έχει έναν βαθιά ριζωμένο αλλά όχι προεξέχοντα ρατσισμό (μεταξύ άλλων). Ήθελε μεγάλες cojones να τολμήσει η συγγραφέας να βάλει μια αφήγηση από την οπτική ενός τέτοιου ανθρώπου. Αναμενόμενα ενόχλησε όσους δεν καταλαβαίνουν τι διαβάζουν ή γιατί, και σε αυτό την παραδέχομαι. Αντίστοιχα ο Μαρκ από το διαλυμένο σπίτι με τον εγκληματία θείο και την πρόωρη, επίπλαστη ενηλικίωση πάνω από την παιδικότητά του και φυσικά τα μοτίβα βιολογικής και ψυχολογικές προσέγγισης / ανάλυσης ενός βριικόλακα.
ΟΜΩΣ...
Το βιβλίο δεν έχει ιστορία. Έχει τα απολύτως ελάχιστα για να κινείται ο χρόνος, όμως πλοκή δεν υπάρχει. Είναι μια σειρά ενατενίσεων πάνω στον βρικόλακα με τον ρόλο που ανέφερα παραπάνω. Επίσης δεν υπάρχει δομή του κόσμου όπου εκτυλίσσεται η δράση: η ντε Γκρουτ παίρνει είδηση τον βρικόλακα απλά επειδή είναι βολικό για το point της συγγραφέα. Δεν υπάρχει άλλος ουσιαστικός λόγος. Το ίδιο οι απαγωγείς του που πιστεύουν πως είναι αυτό που είναι χωρίς κανέναν ιδιαίτερο λόγο. Απλά βολέυει για να περάσουμε στην ενατένιση.
Έπειτα η μαγεία: λειτουργεί, δεν λειτουργεί και γιατί; Υπάρχει το υπερφυσικό στον κόσμο ή ο βρικόλακας είναι απλά μια γενετική ανωμαλία; Όλα αυτά είναι μετέωρα, διότι δεν νοιάζουν τη συγγραφέα. Το πρόβλημα είναι πως ούτε εμένα με ενδιαφέρει να διαβάζω κονωνικούς, ψυχολογικούς και μεταφυσικούς προβληματισμούς ως πρόζα - ή τουλάχιστον, χωρίς να είναι ενταγμένοι σε μια ουσιαστική πλοκή.
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