Book Review- Teeth-Vampire Tales. Anthology

Title: Teeth-Vampire Tales

 Author: Anthology. Edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling

Series: N/A

Published:  April 5 2011

Length: 452 pages

Warnings: vampires, drugs and sex references, profanity, sexual situations,  

Source: Library

Summary : Sink your teeth into these bite-sized tales exploring the intersections among the living, dead, and undead. Features stories by Neil Gaiman, Melissa Marr, Cassandra Clare, Garth Nix, and many more.

Review:  Teeth is an anthology of nineteen stories of varying lengths, all about vampires. As this is an anthology, it will be reviewed story by story, with the title, author, thoughts and strength tea in numbers. The tea strength for the entire book will be the average strength per story.

1. Things to Know About Being Dead by Genevieve Valentine is written as a list, interspersed with relevant stories, that link with both the list and each other. It's written from the perspective of a girl who died and came back, with nice characters and good flow. 4

2. All Smiles by Steve Berman. Saul goes hitchhiking and is picked up by a couple of vampires. It then turns into action, and Saul's realisation that everyone else knew about the vampires, just not him. I like the fast pace, even though at times it got a little confusing. 4

3. Gap Year by Christopher Barzak. Retta and Lottie have a nice little friendship. Then the vampires come to town and Retta and Lottie's friendship breaks up slowly. The character development in this is very good, but this really isn't my type of vampire book.  2

5. Bloody Sunrise by Neil Gaiman. It's a short poem written from the vampire's point of view, about how it rises, goes along life and is bound by a bloody sunrise. It's a pretty little poem, though it doesn't seem to make a point.

5. Flying by Delia Sherman. Lenka is getting over leukaemia, and wants to get back into circus work, like she did before. She then joins a circus of vampires. This is a very nice idea, with a fair amount of character development, but no real conclusion to it. 3

6. Vampire Weather by Garth Nix . In this world, Amos uses religion to protect him from the vampires. When bitten, he is offered  a scientific cure, going against his religion. I liked  some of it, and while some things were understandable, some things seemed to be there for the sake of it. 2

7.Late Bloomers by Suzy McKee Charnas. Josh is a fairly musical boy, although he ends up working at a small shop. A couple of vampires turn up, turn out to be art collectors, and various things happen. I like the idea that a vampire is unable to create anything, and therefore collect stuff instead. The writing flowed well and the characters had good personalities. And on a completely irrelevant note, points to Suzy for the reference to Voltaire-one of my favourite musicians. 3

8. The List of Definite Endings by Kaaron Warren. It follows vampire Claudia and human Ken. Ken's work means he has a list of terminally ill people. Throughout the years, Claudia, who doesn't want to go hunting, uses this list to work out who to take blood from. This is a fairly short story that’s very touching, emotional and ends in a way that ties it all together. 5

9. Best Friends Forever by Cecil Castellucci. Amy the vampire and Gina, a girl who's dying, are very close friends. This is a story that shows exactly how deep their friendship is, and not much more. 2

10. Sit the Dead by Jeffrey Ford. Luke is asked to sit vigil for dead Gracie, with weird uncle Sfortunado. And then Gracie rises as a Gritchino, a type of vampire. This is an action filled vampire story, with about half of it being some kind of action. The other  half is introducing and wrapping up the story. 4

11. Sunbleached by Nathan Ballingrud. Joshua(what is it with vampire stories featuring boys named Josh, and any variations, and girls named Claudia. We'll think about that some other day...) makes friends with a vampire, who attacks his family and transforms Joshua. This was a confusing story and I didn't particularly like the characters. 2

12. Baby by Kathe Koja. It's written by a girl who has come across a baby, who is obviously a vampire from the descriptions. There's not much storyline to it, but I connected enough with it to feel slightly  the end. 3

13. In the Future When All's Well by Catherynne M. Valente. In this world vampires are commonplace, Health and Safety measures go to ridiculous levels against vampirism, and you're fairly likely to turn, especially if you fall into a High Risk group, such as being conceived on a Saturday, being OCD, or having unkempt eyebrows(side note, Hetalia fans; Iggy may be a vampire). This is all about Scout's life in this world, making friends with vampires, and so on. There wasn't much plot, but the world building, and the world created, was excellent.

14. Transition by Melissa Marr. This is a story of love and action...there's not much more I can say without telling you everything that happens. Although it was a bit predictable, I liked the clever foreshadowing, the way the story didn't end once we knew the full details of what happened, and it had a nice ending. 4

15. History by Ellen Kushner. Its written from the point of view of someone in love with a vampire, who has helpfully lived through the majority of things you are studying in your history course. The description was detailed, but not much seemed to happen. 2

16. The Perfect Dinner Party by Cassandra Clare and Holly Black. As the title suggests, it revolver around a dinner party, hosted by a couple of vampires, with a human guest. Who is you. The narrator, a vampire who looks 14, is resenting the fact that her older brother can get along in society just fine and she can't. This all comes out at said dinner party, and various family secrets are revealed. There's a lot of character development in this, but my favourite thing is the way the reader directly involves the reader, with you being the main pronoun at the start until the narrator starts talking about herself. 5

17. Slice of Life by Lucius Shepard. It's centred around Sandrine and Louise aka Louie aka Elle. Sandrine needs people for various reasons, and  Louise gets them for her. There is also a little romance mixed in that doesn't seem to get very far. Parts of this got confusing, as a lot of things happen, and I don't like the way Sandrine and Louise's relationship just stopped, but the character development is great.

18. My Generation by Emma Bull. It's another poem from a vampire's point of view. I like the way that life is viewed in musical terms throughout. 3

19. Why Light? by Tanith Lee. Daisha is going on a journey-she's a vampire still young enough to bear children, and therefore she's basically forced into an arranged marriage with Zeev. However he turns out to be ok and they fall in love anyway. This story isn't really my type, but it was done well enough that I enjoyed it anyway. 3

The new authors I found and want to read more of are ; Steve Berman, Genevieve Valentine, Kaaron Warren, Jeffrey Ford, Catherine M, Valente and Tanith Lee.

Overall:  Strength 3 tea to an anthology full of different types of vampire tales with a story for almost anyone interested in vampires.

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