They Thirst

A vampire turns Los Angeles into a city of the dead in this novel by the New York Times–bestselling and Bram Stoker Award–winning author of Swan Song.   The Kronsteen castle, a gothic monstrosity, looms over Los Angeles. Built during Hollywood’s golden age for a long-dead screen idol with a taste for the macabre, it stands as a decaying reminder of the past. Since the owner’s murder, no living thing has ever again taken up residence. But it isn’t abandoned. Prince Conrad Vulkan, Hungarian master of the vampires, as old as the centuries, calls it home. His plan is to replace all humankind with his kind. And he’s starting with the psychotic dregs of society in the City of Angels.   The number of victims is growing night after night, and so is Vulkan’s legion of the dead. As a glittering city bleeds into a necropolis, a band of vampire hunters takes action: an avenging young boy who saw his parents devoured; a television star whose lover has an affinity for the supernatural; a dying priest chosen by God to defend the world; a female reporter investigating a rash of cemetery desecrations; and LAPD homicide detective Andy Palatazin, an immigrant who survived a vampire attack in his native Hungary when he was child and has been hunting evil across the globe for decades.   Palatazin knows that to stop the Prince of Darkness, one must invade his nest. He knows it’s also a suicide mission. But it’s the only way to save the city—and the world—from vampire domination.   “Suspenseful, exciting, and visceral,” They Thirst is one of the earliest novels by the versatile author of such masterpieces as Boy’s Life, The Wolf’s Hour, and the Matthew Corbett series (Kirkus Reviews).

From Publishers Weekly

Prince Vulkan, master of the vampires, has loosed his army of the undead on Los Angeles in this seamlessly written horror novel by the author of Mine. Vulkan's plan is to replace humankind, city by city, with the living dead. Four people stand in his way. Homicide detective Andy Palatazin, a Hungarian immigrant who fled this scourge as a child, is determined to stop it now. Young Tommy Chandler, whose parents were killed before his eyes, wants revenge. TV star Wes Richer hopes to save his beloved by tracking Vulkan to his lair. Father Silvera, a dying priest, believes that God has chosen him to destroy the vampire prince. Wreaking death and carnage, Vulkan proceeds to a final confrontation between the forces of good and evil. McCammon delivers terror with skillful ferocity as he pays tribute to masters of the genre and raises the standards for the craft a notch or two. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

First hardcover edition of an early (1981) mass-market paperback by the increasingly popular and accomplished McCammon (see Boy's Life, reviewed above). An epic tale of an army of vampires bent on world dominion, the adrenalized, splatter-happy narrative, set in Los Angeles, reflects McCammon's pulp-horror roots even as, in its richness of character and subplot, it presages his latter work (and the influence of Stephen King). Suspenseful, exciting, and visceral--Prince Vulkan of the vampires makes a particularly nasty impression--and a treat for new-found McCammon fans. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Prince Vulkan of the vampires makes a particularly nasty impression

“Suspenseful, exciting, and visceral

Publishers Weekly

“[McCammon] pays tribute to masters of the genre and raises the standards for the craft a notch or two.”

Booklist

“A true master of the Gothic novel.”

From the Inside Flap

First published in 1981, "They Thirst" was Robert McCammon's fourth novel, and it remains one of the major milestones of an ambitious, constantly evolving career. Like its predecessors "Baal," "Bethany's Sin," and "The Night Boat" "They Thirst" made its initial appearance as a paperback original. In the years since, it has acquired an intensely devoted following, and is now widely regarded as one of the significant vampire novels of the 20th century.The story begins in the tiny Hungarian hamlet of Krajeck, where nine-year-old Andre Palatazin awaits the return of his father from an unspecified but clearly dangerous mission. The man who finally returns is no longer Andre's father is no longer, in fact, a man. Pursued by this undead entity, Andre and his mother barely escape with their lives. Decades later, Andre now Andy Palatazin is a homicide detective in the Los Angeles Police Department, and spends his days dealing with the quotidian terrors of a large metropolis. His life takes a darker turn when the demonic forces he first encountered in Krajeck arrive in L.A., led by an ancient vampire known as The Master. The Master's plan: to overrun the city and use it as a stepping-stone toward wider, ultimately global, domination."They Thirst" marks the earliest appearance of McCammon's penchant for epic, wide-angled narratives. With the unobtrusive ease of a natural storyteller, the author propels a wide assortment of vividly created characters through an apocalyptic scenario that combines gritty urban realism with a powerful portrait of supernatural forces at large in the modern world. The result is a genuine classic of the genre, a novel that is as fresh and absorbing today as it was more than thirty years ago.

About the Author

One of the founders of the Horror Writers Association, Robert R. McCammon (b. 1952) is one of the country’s most accomplished authors of modern horror and historical fiction. Raised by his grandparents in Birmingham, Alabama, McCammon published his first novel, the Revelations-inspired Baal, when he was only twenty-six. His writings continued in a supernatural vein throughout the 1980s, producing such bestselling titles as Swan Song, The Wolf’s Hour, and Stinger.  In 1991 Boy’s Life won the World Fantasy Award for best novel. After his next novel, Gone South, McCammon took a break from writing to spend more time with his family. He did not publish another novel until 2002’s Speaks the Nightbird. Since then he has followed “fixer” Matthew Corbett in two sequels, The Queen of Bedlam and Mister Slaughter. His newest novel is The Five. McCammon and his family continue to live in Birmingham.

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