Weird. Garish, brillant, ludicrous, insane. To Excess.The reviews aren't conveying how crazy half of this nightmare of a book is. The other half has a logical plot and they didn't always mix too well, as if the shiny parody of a fallen god had read the numinous recipe for a black swan curry backwards. Or something.The first flowery chapters of The Golden are deceptive. Except for some details, it didn't seem it was a Shepard. Oh but it was!The hero was all angsty about his relationship with the adoring victim he seduced into enacting an overly literal metaphor of stereotypical gender roles. I've never read Twilight but I was concerned for a moment it was going to mine that same vein. My lack of faith is disturbing, isn't it?It soon became clear the setting was a dreamworld and the monsters started showing their ugly side. By the way of a WARNING, shortly before being double-kneecapped with a blunt weapon, one of them even volunteered a description of how he raped a child, something even authors who are trying to be edgy often shy away from.One of the good thins about The Golden is the unusally convincing portrayal of ridiculously powerful and immortal sociopaths. Shepard shows and his characters tell. The hypocritical rants are pretty decent actually. Prepare from some predictable Christian-bashing though.The interminable psychological struggle of the angsty hero who needs to come to terms with who he has become is also well done, considering. There might be too much monologue for some tastes but it does tie in with the plot and the gory scenes.The mystery aspect is competently done, with solid foreshadowing. The hero was a bit slow in piecing together the clues but that was the only way I was going to get the satisfaction of figuring it out a step or two ahead of him.The transitions between these logical parts and the Lynchian dream sequences was sometimes jarring. And the transitions with the nightmare sequences more so.But the mix of dream logic and action thriller isn't all bad. For one thing, it's easier to sell a ridiculous amount of fun twists in an all-out fantastical story.If you don't know how Shepard writes, his showy style is often badly over the top. But it's evocative or at least intriguing.In this book, I got annyoned by the overuse of a particular construction, as if the author got tired of a more pedestrian word which was to be oversued in social media as well. He probably did it on purpose.I can't shake the impression that the book was littered with literary references I didn't get. But then I don't particularly care.*SLIGHT SPOILERS BELOW*Amazingly, the romance worked for me. This is no small feat!I'm mentionning this in the spoilery section because it's clever enough that for much of the book, it's not clear it's a romance.I also enjoyed the way some popular metaphors are given a literal twist.
Some Amazing Writing in a Fantasy Vampire Novel Marred by Major IssuesI really wish I could give this book a higher rating.Lucius Shepard is a very gifted writer.His baroque descriptions of the labyrinthine grotesqueries of the huge vampire stronghold in Carpathia, Castle Banat, are worth the price of admission. He's kind of the Hieronymous Bosch of fantasy writing (I mean the bizarre medieval painter, not Michael Connolly's detective who's named after him). I could live with his often purple prose.But...this novel had so many other issues for me.The first problem was the characters. I never really understood or empathized with the main characters. There is Michel Beheim, the former Paris policeman turned vampire. He's courageous, ethical, and a thorough investigator, but I had trouble caring about him. He's supposed to have a conscience, and he does, until his vampire instincts take over. There's Alexandra, his beautiful vampire lover. I found her inscrutable and unsympathetic. Then there is the dialogue. I'm guessing Shepard was going for a formality suggesting aristocrats in an indeterminate time in the past. But most of it just came off as stilted and unrealistic. Here's an example:" 'I disagree,' she said. 'It's the easiest of all questions to answer, unless one has something to hide.''I don't wish to appear foolish,' he said".The story involved Beheim in a murder investigation. A beautiful human girl, the Golden, is bred especially for the complexity and appeal of her blood. There is to be a ceremony called a "Decanting" in which she is turned into a vampire. However, her brutally murdered corpse is found in Castle Banat before the Decanting ceremony. Beheim is charged with finding the murderer.The story did hold my attention until Beheim's descent into a hell-like dimension in search of The Patriarch, the mysterious creature in charge of Castle Banat. Things just got so incoherent there that I lost interest in the novel.Beheim does catch the crook and it's no one you would expect it to be. But at that point, I no longer cared. Shepard writes well enough that I'd definitely give him another chance, though. He writes in a lot of different sub-genres of fantasy. I'm hoping that he did better in another of his novels.
Do You like book The Golden (2006)?
Lucius Shepard's "Green Eyes" gave us the first Lacanian faux-zombie existential romance--- a wonderful and wonderfully different kind of zombie tale. "The Golden" is his vampire tale, and while I liked it...or liked it in small doses...it's not "Green Eyes". There is something of "Anno Dracula" and "Empire of Fear" here--- the vampire society and its own culture and rituals ---as well as Peake's Gormenghast or any number of Gothick romances, with the characters encased in a surreal building (castle, manor house, Library of Babel)...which makes the story a bit creaky and formalised. So, then--- a vampire murder mystery, complete with ex-police detective vampire and a host of suspects and diversionary clues and subplots. Shepard allows the dialogue to become a bit stilted and tries unsuccessfully to expand the world he's creating past its initial Poirot-amidst-vampires ideas. Still, though, not a bad read. Worth a winter's night.
—DoctorM
Kultainen on vampyyrimurhamysteeri, jossa murhamysteerin selvittämiseen ei ilmeisesti tarvita perinteistä salapoliisityötä, vaan murhaaja selviää vahingossa ja siihenkin johtavat tapahtumat ovat satunnaisia epämääräisyyksiä. Jotenkin tästä jäi sellainen tuntu, että valtaosa ilmaan heitetyistä juonentyngistä jäivät vain niiksi: irrallisiksi juonentyngiksi, macguffineiksi, joille ei loppujen lopuksi ollut minkään kanssa mitään tekemistä.Parin bussimatkan pikalukemiseksi tämä kyllä sopi, muttei Kultaista oikein kehtaisi mihinkään suositella. "Tulipahan luettua".
—Mjl
From across the world, the vampire clans are gathering. Then there's a murder and it's up to a novice vampire, that used to be a police detective to wade through all the political intrigue, dozens of suspects and clues to solve it.It's a 30's noir detective story set in the middle of an Anne Rice vampire novel.Very clever, with a decently constructed mythology, but because it all takes place in this secluded gathering place , full of vampires, it all feels a bit dream-like and surreal. This creates a nice atmosphere, but also gives it a feeling of unreality that kind of watered down the suspense.Still, a great idea, a likable hero and an entertaining read.
—Travis
