Count Dracula kicks off the coffin lid again in this updated vampire tale, ready to stalk through the rubble of post-Communist Europe. This time, however, the count's sanguinary tippling habits may hold the cure for both AIDS and cancer. The key lies with a Romanian orphan adopted by American hematologist Kate Neuman; the infant, Joshua, has a series of rare diseases, and can survive only because his body extracts and processes genetic material from blood transfusions. If the virus in his system responsible for this ability can be isolated, his diseases could be remedied and medical marvels would be within Kate's grasp. The drawback is that Joshua has inherited his talents from the decrepit but murderous Vlad Dracula, and this patriarch of an accursed clan of blood-drinkers is more interested in perpetuating his power than in providing miracle cures for the masses. Simmons ( Song of Kali ) makes Children 's fantastical scientific claims easy to swallow, although the medical jargon in some of the American scenes is thicker than Bela Lugosi's accent (try out ``hypogammaglobulinemia''). Still, the book offers a mesmerizing tour through the ghostly, gray tatters of Romania. ( July)
Children of the Night
Narrated by George Ralph
Dan SimmonsUnabridged — 14 hours, 31 minutes
Children of the Night
Narrated by George Ralph
Dan SimmonsUnabridged — 14 hours, 31 minutes
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Overview
Editorial Reviews
While studying diseases of the blood in present-day Romania, hematologist Kate Neuman adopts an orphaned infant with an unusual immune system. Upon her return to the States, the baby is kidnapped and returned to its homeland. Aided by an American priest and a Romanian medical student, each with his own interest in the child, Kate traces it to a mysterious group linked to the legendary Dracula. Her attempts to discover the motive behind the kidnapping and to reclaim the baby form the heart of this thrilling and wonderfully diverting novel. Simmons ( Summer of the Night , LJ 1/91) gives a chilling description of post-Ceausescu Romania and neatly ties the vampire legend into political history to create a new and clever twist to the idea of the vampire's craving for blood. The ending seems a bit too Indiana Jones-like, but the overall result is satisfying. An excellent choice for popular fiction collections. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 2/1/92.-- Eric W. Johnson, Teikyo Post Univ. Lib., Waterbury, Ct.
Simmons (Summer of Night, Carrion Comfort, Song of Kali, etc.) slips into Bram Stoker/Anne Rice territory and writes his best novel ever. The title's children of the night are those frail, ravaged infants we see televised from Romanian orphanages. Is it bad taste to suck blood from those fly-covered kids to pump up a commercial horror novel? Well, Simmons puts them to such imaginative use that ghastliness disappears. It seems that the late dictator Ceauescu and his wonderful wife Elena—in the pay of Romania's strigoi, the vampire family haunting Romania since the 1400's—outlawed birth control so that orphanages could burgeon as living blood banks for needy vamps. Vampire ruler Vernor Deacon Trent (Lord Dracula), who has had Castle Dracula rebuilt—after many, many centuries—is tired of life, wishes to die and to invest his title in his offspring, the infant Joshua. However, Joshua, now being kept in an orphanage, is adopted by American research hematologist Kate Newman, who takes him to America. Using marvelous equipment, she discovers that Joshua has both an extraordinary, all-encompassing blood type and an organ in his stomach for digesting blood and rebuilding it as a vehicle for superimmunity. Clearly, Joshua's blood, once the chemists can break it down, will supply agents that can lick AIDS, cancer, and you name it. (Simmons's strongest ploy is the superb panache of his immense and endless pedantry about blood types, which he treats as if Jesus were being reborn in this amazing blood gift.) But the strigoi chase down Kate and Joshua in the States, trash Kate's lab and research, and kidnap Joshua. Kate takes off for Romania in the company of a soon-to-resignCatholic priest (don't miss the bathtub scene as he breaks 18 years of celibacy), and once there fights her way to Castle Dracula on the eve of Joshua's investiture.... Toothsomely well written.
A mesmerizing tour through the ghostly, gray tatters of Romania.” —Publishers Weekly
“Simmons gives a chilling description of post-Ceausescu Romania and neatly ties the vampire legend into political history to create a new and clever twist to the idea of the vampire's craving for blood.” —Library Journal
“His best novel ever… Toothsomely well written.” —Kirkus
“Brilliant ideas… The most rigorous and interesting scientific rationale for vampirism I've ever seen… You keep turning the pages.” —Locus
“Simmons writes like a hot-rodding angel, loading his American nightmare with scares, suspense, and a sweet, surprising nostalgia. One of those rare must-read books, I am in awe of Dan Simmons.” —Stephen King on The Summer of Night
“It stands with the best of King and Straub in the traditional modern horror genre.” —Seattle Post Intelligencer on The Summer of Night
“Impressive...combines beautiful writing and suspense into a book for which Dan Simmons deserves the bestseller status of King and Koontz.” —Denver Post on The Summer of Night
“An outstandingly eerie and truly horrifying tale, a page-turner of the first order.” —Dallas Times-Herald on The Summer of Night
“One can only wonder what Simmons will do next, now that he's shown us he can do everything the best writers in horror and science fiction can do.” —Philadelphia Inquirer on The Summer of Night
“If you like Stephen King's It and The Body, you will be enthralled by Summer of Night.” —Rocky Mountain News on The Summer of Night
“Blood-freezing scenarios... the true source of Simmons' terrifying vision lies in his uncanny ability to tap into that primal dread that every child knows and every adult denies; the monster under the bed, the darkness in the closet, the not-quite-human face at the window.... If you are easily frightened, don't buy this book.” —Los Angeles Daily News on The Summer of Night
“A superior read in the genre.” —Kirkus Reviews on The Summer of Night
“An outstandingly eerie horror story about a group of Midwestern boys stalked by an ancient evil.” —Publishers Weekly on The Summer of Night
“Simmons, winner of several prestigious awards for science fiction and horror ranks with the best the genre has to offer... The children are well drawn and affecting in their bravery.” —Library Journal on The Summer of Night
“Skilled writer par excellence Dan Simmons takes a subject straight from Stephen King land and runs with it… Simmons keeps the tension high.” —Locus on The Summer of Night
“One of the best supernatural chillers in years... Summer of Night promises to mark the dawn of a great horror novelist.” —Flint Journal on The Summer of Night
“Lots of frights in the ‘Night'… The kind of story that has readers locking doors and checking under their own beds even as the characters in the book go through their own nightly ritual.” —Ocala Star-Banner on The Summer of Night
“For those of us to whom good writing is everything, the name Dan Simmons bears great weight.” —Harlan Ellison on The Summer of Night
“Simmons is not only good, he's versatile.” —Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine on The Summer of Night
“A compelling writer.” —F. Paul Wilson, author of The Keep, on The Summer of Night
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940171526863 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Brilliance Audio |
| Publication date: | 02/22/2008 |
| Series: | Seasons of Horror , #2 |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
Read an Excerpt
ONE
We flew to Bucharest almost as soon as the shooting had stopped, landing at Otopeni Airport just after midnight on December 29, 1989. As the semiofficial “International Assessment Contingent,” the six of us were met at my Lear jet, escorted through the confused milling that passed for Customs since Romania’s revolution, and then herded aboard an Office of National Tourism VIP van for the nine-mile drive into town. They had brought a wheelchair to the bottom of the aircraft ramp for me, but I waved it away and made the walk to the van myself. It was not easy.
Donna Wexler, our U.S. Embassy liaison, pointed at two bullet holes in the wall near where the van was parked, but Dr. Aimslea topped that by simply pointing out the window as we drove around the lighted circular drive connecting the terminal to the highway.
Soviet-style tanks sat along the main thoroughfare where cabs normally would be waiting, their long muzzles pointed toward the entrance to the airport drive. Sandbagged emplacements lined the highway and airport rooftops, and the sodium-vapor lamps yellowly illuminated the helmets and rifles of soldiers on guard duty while throwing their faces into deep shadow. Other men, some in regular army uniforms and others in the ragtag clothing of the revolutionary militia, lay sleeping alongside the tanks. For a second the illusion of sidewalks littered with the bodies of Romania’s dead was perfect and I held my breath, exhaling slowly only when I saw one of the bodies stir and another light a cigarette.
“They fought off several counterattacks by loyalist troops and Securitate forces last week,” whispered Donna Wexler. Her tone suggested that it was an embarrassing topic, like sex.
Radu Fortuna, the little man who had been hurriedly introduced to us in the terminal as our guide and liaison with the transitional government, turned in his seat and grinned broadly as if he were not embarrassed by either sex or politics. “They kill many Securitate,” he said loudly, his grin growing ever wider. “Three times Ceausescu’s people tried to take airport … three times they get killed.”
Wexler nodded and smiled, obviously uncomfortable with the conversation, but Dr. Aimslea leaned into the aisle. Light from the last of the sodium-vapor lamps illuminated his bald head in the seconds before we entered the darkness of the empty highway. “So Ceausescu’s regime is really over?” he said to Fortuna.
I could see only the slightest gleam from the Romanian’s grin in the sudden darkness. “Ceausescu is over, yes, yes,” he said. “They take him and that bitch-cow of a wife in Tîrgoviste, you know … have, how you call it … trial.” Radu Fortuna laughed again, a sound which somehow sounded both childish and cruel. I found myself shivering a bit in the darkness. The bus was not heated.
“They have trial,” continued Fortuna, “and prosecutor say, ‘You both crazy?’ You see, if Ceausescu and Mrs. Ceausescu crazy, then maybe the army just send them away in mental hospital for hundred years, like our Russian friends do. You know? But Ceausescu say, ‘What? What? Crazy … How dare you! That is obscene provocation!’ And his wife, she say, ‘How can you say this to the Mother of your nation?’ So prosecutor say, ‘OK, you neither one crazy. Your own mouth say.’ And then the soldiers, they draw straws so many want to be the ones. Then the lucky ones, they take Ceausescus out in courtyard and shoot them in heads many times.” Fortuna chuckled warmly, as if remembering a favorite anecdote. “Yes, regime over,” he said to Dr. Aimslea. “Maybe a few thousand Securitate, they don’t know it yet and still shooting peoples, but that will be over soon. Bigger problem is, what to do with one out of three peoples who spy for old government, heh?”
Fortuna chuckled again, and in the sudden glare from an oncoming army truck, I could see his silhouette as he shrugged. There was a thin layer of condensation turning to ice on the inside of the windows now. My fingers were stiff with the cold and I could barely feel my toes in the absurd Bally dress shoes I had put on that morning. I scraped at some of the ice on my window as we entered the city proper.
“I know that you are all very important peoples from the West,” said Radu Fortuna, his breath creating a small fog that rose toward the roof of the bus like an escaping soul. “I know you are famous Western billionaire, Mr. Vernor Deacon Trent, who pay for this visit,” he said, nodding at me, “but I am afraid I forget some other names.”
Donna Wexler did the introductions. “Doctor Aimslea is with the World Health Organization … Father Michael O’Rourke is here representing both the Chicago Archdiocese and the Save the Children Foundation.”
“Ah, good to have priest here,” said Fortuna, and I heard something that may have been irony in his voice.
“Doctor Leonard Paxley, Professor Emeritus of Economics at Princeton University,” continued Wexler. “Winner of the 1978 Nobel Prize in Economics.”
Fortuna bowed toward the old academic. Paxley had not spoken at all during the flight from Frankfurt, and now he seemed lost in his oversized coat and folds of muffler: an old man in search of a park bench.
“We welcome you,” said Fortuna, “even though our country have no economy at present moment.”
“Goddamn, is it always this cold here?” came the voice from deep in the folds of wool. The Nobel Prize–winning Professor Emeritus stamped his small feet. “This is cold enough to freeze the nuts off a bronze bulldog.”
“And Mr. Carl Berry, representing American Telegraph and Telephone,” continued Wexler quickly.
The pudgy businessman next to me puffed his pipe, removed it, nodded in Fortuna’s direction, and went back to smoking the thing as if it were a necessary source of heat. I had a moment’s mad vision of the seven of us in the bus huddled around the glowing embers in Berry’s pipe.
“And you say you remember our sponsor, Mr. Trent,” finished Wexler.
“Yesss,” said Radu Fortuna. His eyes glittered as he looked at me through Berry’s pipe smoke and the fog of his own breath. I could almost see my image in those glistening eyes—one very old man, deep-set eyes sunken even deeper from the fatigue of the trip, body shriveled and shrunken in my expensive suit and overcoat. I am sure that I looked older than Paxley, older than Methuselah … older than God.
“You have been in Romania before, I believe?” continued Fortuna. I could see the guide’s eyes glowing brighter as we reached the lighted part of the city. I spent time in Germany shortly after the war. The scene out the window behind Fortuna was like that. There were more tanks in Palace Square, black hulks which one would have thought deserted heaps of cold metal if the turret of one had not tracked us as our van passed by. There were the sooty corpses of burned-out autos and at least one armored personnel carrier that was now only a piece of scorched steel. We turned left and went past the Central University Library; its gold dome and ornate roof had collapsed between soot-streaked, pockmarked walls.
“Yes,” I said. “I have been here before.”
Fortuna leaned toward me. “And perhaps this time one of your corporations will open a plant here, yes?”
“Perhaps.”
Fortuna’s gaze did not leave me. “We work very cheap here,” he whispered so softly that I doubt if anyone else except Carl Berry could hear him. “Very cheap. Labor is very cheap here. Life is very cheap here.”
We had turned left off of the empty Calea Victoriei, right again on Bulevardul Nicolae Balcescu, and now the van screeched to a halt in front of the tallest building in the city, the twenty-two-story Intercontinental Hotel.
“In the morning, gentlemens,” said Fortuna, rising, gesturing the way toward the lighted foyer, “we will see the new Romania. I wish you dreamless sleeps.”
Copyright © 1992 by Dan Simmons
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