The Queen of the Damned - Abridged: The Vampire Chronicles
Written by Anne Rice
Narrated by Kate Nelligan and David Purdham
3.5/5
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About this audiobook
In 1976, a uniquely seductive world of vampires was unveiled in the now-classic Interview with the Vampire . . . in 1985, a wild and voluptuous voice spoke to us, telling the story of The Vampire Lestat. In The Queen of the Damned, Anne Rice continues her extraordinary "Vampire Chronicles" in a feat of mesmeric storytelling, a chillingly hypnotic entertainment in which the oldest and most powerful forces of the night are unleashed on an unsuspecting world.
Three brilliantly colored narrative threads intertwine as the story unfolds:
- The rock star known as Vampire Lestat, worshipped by millions of spellbound fans, prepares for a concert in San Francisco. Among the audience--pilgrims in a blind swoon of adoration--are hundreds of vampires, creatures who see Lestat as a "greedy fiend risking the secret prosperity of all his kind just to be loved and seen by mortals," fiends themselves who hate Lestat's power and who are determined to destroy him . . .
- The sleep of certain men and women--vampires and mortals scattered around the world--is haunted by a vivid, mysterious dream: of twins with fiery red hair and piercing green eyes who suffer an unspeakable tragedy. It is a dream that slowly, tauntingly reveals its meaning to the dreamers as they make their way toward each other--some to be destroyed on the journey, some to face an even more terrifying fate at journey's end . . .
- Akasha--Queen of the Damned, mother of all vampires, rises after a 6,000 year sleep and puts into motion a heinous plan to "save" mankind from itself and make "all myths of the world real" by elevating herself and her chosen son/lover to the level of the gods: "I am the fulfillment and I shall from this moment be the cause" . . .
These narrative threads wind sinuously across a vast, richly detailed tapestry of the violent, sensual world of vampirism, taking us back 6,000 years to its beginnings. As the stories of the "first brood" of blood drinkers are revealed, we are swept across the ages, from Egypt to South America to the Himalayas to all the shrouded corners of the globe where vampires have left their mark. Vampires are created--mortals succumbing to the sensation of "being enptied, of being devoured, of being nothing." Vampires are destroyed. Dark rituals are performed--the rituals of ancient creatures prowling the modern world. And, finally, we are brought to a moment in the twentieth century when, in an astonishing climax, the fate of the living dead--and perhaps of the living, all the living--will be decided.
Anne Rice
A.N. Roquelaure is the pseudonym for bestselling author Anne Rice, the author of 25 books. She lives in New Orleans.
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Reviews for The Queen of the Damned - Abridged
2,854 ratings52 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anne Rice is the author to go to when you want to read a really good vampire novel. Not the type of vampire novels where vampires sparkle and are just too over the top (eye roll). This is vampires done well, with all the rich details and history to go along with them. I love this series and need to pick it back up again - I got stuck on the 6th one and need to push through it!
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Good book. SOOOOO glad I read this before the TERRIBLE movie came out. Nothing but an advertisement for a lousy singer and a bunch of Y2K NU Metal bands. If you read this.....stay as far away from the film as possible and enjoy the story for what it is.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5OK, I have no idea why in hell Anne Rice allowed Hollywood to make that movie that's "supposedly" an adaptation of this book! They are so utterly & completely different it makes me hate the film. There was SO much of the plot and so many characters that were in the book but left out of the film it makes me confused as to how anyone can see them as the same let alone similar. I'm partial to the film Interview with the Vampire, however Queen of the Damned is nothing but a poppy vampire fad film now after reading the real story of the book. While I'm excited to continue the book series, I also believe that if there's a film series that needs a reboot, it's THIS series. And DO IT RIGHT THIS TIME DAMMIT!!!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Explanation of the vampire mythos of Anne Rice. Lestat continues to be an incorrigible rogue.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5OK, I have no idea why in hell Anne Rice allowed Hollywood to make that movie that's "supposedly" an adaptation of this book! They are so utterly & completely different it makes me hate the film. There was SO much of the plot and so many characters that were in the book but left out of the film it makes me confused as to how anyone can see them as the same let alone similar. I'm partial to the film Interview with the Vampire, however Queen of the Damned is nothing but a poppy vampire fad film now after reading the real story of the book. While I'm excited to continue the book series, I also believe that if there's a film series that needs a reboot, it's THIS series. And DO IT RIGHT THIS TIME DAMMIT!!!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Finished last night. Anne Rice's books always take me long to read. It seems I can only take about 50 pages a day although at the end i was reading it a bit faster.
I really liked to read about the twins, not so much about Akasha and lestat.
What to do? Shall I try to get a copy of The Tale of The Body Thief?
3.5 stars on goodreads.which means an 8 out of 10 for me - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Really torn on this one. Found myself enthralled by the origin story of the vampires, yet found myself annoyed with the trite nature of the final discussion: are humans good or evil? Much of the arguments for them being good sound like some thing from the Lion King. I was also a bit perturbed by how sudden the end of the conflict comes. Finally, Rice spends much time setting up the remainder of the series with the introduction of newer characters and this dilutes the punch of this novel.
In the end, it's worth a read to learn the history of the vampires as well as to provide the conclusion to the saga of Lestat the rock star, but as a novel, it suffers greatly from "middle book" syndrome: wrapping up old story lines and laying the ground for new ones while not being solid enough on its own. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ok so this next book is definitely the best so far in the series. Even though it is the best it still isn't my kind of story. So I give it 3.5 stars.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Great read for vampire lovers.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Strange that a book that brought so many feelings of anxiety about death and the hereafter would leave me prouder of the human race at the end.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Long, too long... Anne Rice is not famous for the fast-paced action in her book but this one is just to Anne-Ricy for me :o)
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5There seems to be something about Anne Rice's books that has me a little puzzled. A while ago I read 'Blood Canticle' which I liked but something about the book irked me a little. I had then guessed I would probably like the earlier books in the Lestat series better. And I did, I enjoyed this book much more than Blood Canticle. I really like the sensuous almost erotic feel this book has, it makes it all the more exciting. I love the mixture of old and new.What bugged me a little is the jumping from a first person narrative to a thirs person, later in the book. And sometimes Rice's language. (I just can't figure out what bothers me about it though.)
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Definately one of the best out of the Vampire Chronicles gives a great history on the vampires beginings!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book has its ups and downs, in sections I'm total in love with it and in others it just doesn't click. I'm not sure why but Lestat's sections just don't work and are the ones that don't click the most in this book. But this is an interesting continuation of the the Vampire Chronicles, where all of our old members Louis, Lesat, and Armand along with others are all there and all together but facing the threat of their lives. But I'm not sure to give this 3 or 4 stars, so I'm going with 4.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A pivotal book in the series. Great.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is the third installment of the Vampire Chronicles. Now we meet some of the more ancient vampires as new characters are introduced to us. A truly elaborate mosaic of vampire lore and history spread out over six thousand years.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This was the last of the vampire chronicles that I read. It just did not engage me like the first two books. I read it when it first came out but I remember really looking forward to the book. My expectations may have been too high.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A pivotal book in the series. Great.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5At first, I hated the concept of having to read this book while jumping back and forth in between the different stories of different characters. But as I kept reading on, I found myself loving every character that I had to read about, and I was anxious to find out what heppened next with Lestat, Jessie, or the story of the legendary twins. I found myself reading through this book faster than I thought I would. Despite the fact that it's thicker than the two books before it in the Vampire Chronicles, I read it much faster than I had with the two previous books.I love the story in it, although I didn't like how easily Lestat fell into doing things he definitely shouldn't have been doing...
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Perhaps my least favorite in the series due to its choppy presentation of various seemingly unrelated (but of course are related) story lines. I must admit, however, that the stories involving Queen Akasha are highly entertaining. Appropriate for high school and beyond.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Third book of the Vampire Series. Not as good as Interview with a Vampire, but I liked getting to meet the other vampires.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I stopped here; it seemed a good ending place with the subplots are all tied up. My wife went on to read the rest of the Lestat books, but nothing in her descriptions causes me to feel any desire to go onward to new stories.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lestat wakes Akasha, the Mother of Vampires. Excellent read. (The movies was an abomination.) Wonderful book. My favorite so far.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The third book in The Vampire Chronicles, Queen of the Damned, follows three parallel storylines.The rock star Vampire Lestat prepares for a concert in San Francisco, unaware that hundreds of vampires will be among the fans that night and that they are committed to destroying him for risking exposing them all.The sleep of a group of men and women, vampires and mortals, around the world is disturbed by a mysterious dream of red-haired twins who suffer an unspeakable tragedy. The dreamers, as if pulled, move toward each other, the nightmare becoming clearer the closer they get. Some die on the way, some live to face they terrifying fate their pilgrimage is building to.Lestat's journey to a cavern deep beneath a Greek Island on his quest for the origins of the vampire race awakened Akasha, Queen of the Damed and mother of all vampires, from her 6,000 year sleep. Awake and angry, Akasha plans to save mankind from itself by elevating herself and her chosen son/lover to the level of the gods.As these three threads wind seamlessly together, the origins and culture of vampires are revealed, as is the length and breadth of their effect on the mortal world. The threads are brought together in the twentieth century when the fate of the living and the living dead is rewritten.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Some parts I didn't quite get, but I did lke this book.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is my favorite out of the series.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is my favorite novel of the Vampire Chronicles. It pulls together a massive cast of the characters with interesting stories, and Rice handles it all very well, building right up to the confrontation at the end.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When I started this book, I really had problems getting into it. I think that the problem for me was that it skipped around quite a bit between characters in the beginning and tried to introduce several new ones only to kill off some of them immediatly. In essence, I guess it took me out of my comfort zone and I wasn't too sure that I liked it.But, perseverance paid off and after 150 pages or so, I found myself drawn deeply into this robust story. The book is well written, taking us between current events happening with our vampire friends and deeper into the vampire mythology than we have ever been. Most of this novel focuses on the creation of the vampire race and it certainly does not disappoint. Ms. Rice has created a rich, lush background for her version of the vampire species and by linking them to current events happening to her characters, she makes the history itself come alive...literally!
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5OK. She lost me on this one.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A good installment of the Vampire Chronicles.