Overview

Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias meet Dracula in this Southern-flavored supernatural thriller set in the '90s about a women's book club that must protect its suburban community from a mysterious and handsome stranger who turns out to be a real monster. Patricia Campbell's life has never felt smaller. Her ambitious husband is too busy to give her a goodbye kiss in the morning, her kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she's always a step behind on thank-you notes and her endless list of chores. The one thing she has to look forward to is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime and paperback fiction. At these meetings they're as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are marriage, motherhood, and neighborhood gossip. This predictable pattern is upended when Patricia meets James Harris, a handsome stranger who moves into the neighborhood to take care of his elderly aunt and ends up joining the book club. James is sensitive and well-read, and he makes Patricia feel things she hasn't felt in twenty years. But there's something off about him. He doesn't have a bank account, he doesn't like going out during the day, and Patricia's mother-in-law insists that she knew him when she was a girl--an impossibility. When local children go missing, Patricia and the book club members start to suspect James is more of a Bundy than a Beatnik--but no one outside of the book club believes them. Have they read too many true crime books, or have they invited a real monster into their homes?

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9781094136943

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Reviews

Hendrix has masterfully blended the disaffected housewife trope with a terrifying vampire tale, and the anxiety and tension are palpable...A cheeky, spot-on pick for book clubs. -- Booklist (starred review) Grady Hendrix has cemented his place as a literary luminary...Cancel your plans and lock your doors-you won't be able to stop reading this one until the very end. -- Sarah Gailey, Hugo Award-winning author of Magic for Liars Every vampire novel is going to have blood and teeth, but this one's got that one essential ingredient that nobody else does like Grady Hendrix: heart. These aren't characters, they're people. -- Stephen Graham Jones, author of The Only Good Indians [Hendrix's] best book yet. Fans of smart horror will sink their teeth into this one. -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review) The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is funny and warm and it's genuinely creepy and disturbing. Grady recreates a time and place without the dangerous, distortive lens of nostalgia. -- Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World [A] clever, addictive vampire thriller...[with] perfectly-pitched allusions to classic horror novels and true crime accounts. This powerful, eclectic novel both pays homage to the literary vampire canon and stands singularly within it. -- Publishers Weekly (starred review) This genre-bending vampire story helps cement horror as a frontier for feminist storytelling. -- BookPage A vampire's hunger for blood may be insatiable, but this masterpiece novel ladles out ample thrills, chills, and relevant examples of sociopolitical injustices to satisfy any literary appetite. -- Foreword Reviews

This powerful, eclectic novel both pays homage to the literary vampire canon and stands singularly within it. -- Publishers Weekly (starred review) Hendrix is one of the finest new genre voices we have in literature. -- Film School Rejects, praise for the author Hendrix has masterfully blended the disaffected housewife trope with a terrifying vampire tale, and the anxiety and tension are palpable...A cheeky, spot-on pick for book clubs. -- Booklist (starred review) Grady Hendrix has cemented his place as a literary luminary...Cancel your plans and lock your doors-you won't be able to stop reading this one until the very end. -- Sarah Gailey, Hugo Award-winning author of Magic for Liars Every vampire novel is going to have blood and teeth, but this one's got that one essential ingredient that nobody else does like Grady Hendrix: heart. These aren't characters, they're people. -- Stephen Graham Jones, author of The Only Good Indians An indie horror legend. -- Book Riot, praise for the author A vampire's hunger for blood may be insatiable, but this masterpiece novel ladles out ample thrills, chills, and relevant examples of sociopolitical injustices to satisfy any literary appetite. -- Foreword Reviews (starred review) [Hendrix's] best book yet. Fans of smart horror will sink their teeth into this one. -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review) [A] national treasure. -- Wall Street Journal, praise for the author The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is funny and warm and it's genuinely creepy and disturbing. Grady recreates a time and place without the dangerous, distortive lens of nostalgia. -- Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World

Author Information

Grady Hendrix is a novelist and screenwriter based in New York City. He is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Paperbacks from Hell, and the Shirley Jackson and Locus Award nominated author of Horrorstör, My Best Friend's Exorcism, and We Sold Our Souls, which have received critical praise from such outlets as NPR, the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, the A.V. Club, Paste, Buzzfeed, and more. He has contributed to Playboy, The Village Voice, and Variety. Bahni Turpin has guest starred in many television series, including NYPD Blue, Law & Order, Six Feet Under, and Cold Case. Her film credits include Brokedown Palace and Crossroads. She has won numerous AudioFile Earphones Awards and three prestigious Audie Awards.

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