Hands up if you've never heard of Anne Rice.

If you haven't you should be ashamed of yourself!  Only joking.

Recognise the picture on the left? Anne Rice wrote the original novel which she adapted to be used as the screenplay for the film.
 
 
 

I absolutely adored the film, but I'm more in love with the books.  I mean no detriment to anyone involved in the making of the film.

Sometimes the imagery inside your own imagination are better than anything somebody else could think up.  Besides, let's face it, nobody could afford the special effects that you can conjure up in your own head!

I was very sceptical when I heard that Tom Cruise was cast as Lestat.  (I'm sure I wasn't alone in that!)  However, to watch him as Lestat, well, he was excellent, I feel that he captured the 'spirit' of Lestat.  I really couldn't see anyone else as Lestat now.  Every time I re-read the Chronicles, I can see and hear Tom Cruise as Lestat.  Oh, and before I go, I think Antonio Banderas made a very delicious Armand.  (I bet I'm not alone with that thought!).
 
 

Anne Rice
Born in New Orleans in 1941, she is the second daughter of an Irish Catholic family. Anne Rice is the author of the phenomenally (and deservedly, in my humble opinion) successful gothic horror tales, The Vampire Chronicles.
 

It is these Chronicles that I absolutely adore, and I would like the rest of the world (if they don't already know about them) to find out about them.  (Those with Internet access, anyway!)
 
 

If you didn't think it was possible to feel pity towards a character in a book, well think again.  With Anne Rice's characters in The Vampire Chronicles, you might actually  find yourself feeling pity, anger and terror towards these  'creatures' who are usually loathed and detested.

The Chronicles are powerfully evocative.  Some may find this hard to believe, some may say that they're just books, (some might, and probably do, say that I'm barking mad) but with Anne Rice's wonderful narrative, you can almost see into their very hearts and souls.

To feel pity towards a 'monster' is unusual.  To actually view Lestat as a 'monster' is hard.  Given, he is rather ruthless, but you can't fault his charismatic presence.  His grace and elegance set him aside from other more 'orthodox' versions of a vampire.

Don't take my word for it, find out for yourselves... read on.

The Vampire Chronicles Anne O'Brien Rice

Book One: Interview With The Interview (1976)
Book Two: The Vampire Lestat (1985)
Book Three: Queen Of The Damned (1988)
Book Four: The Tale Of The Body Thief (1992)
Book Four: Memnoch The Devil (1995)

The following are the synopsis's on a few of the dust jackets:

Book One: Interview with the Vampire

"In a darkened room a young man sits telling the macabre and eerie story of his life... the story of a vampire, gifted with eternal life, cursed with an exquisite craving for human blood."

This book introduces the main characters to us, the reader.

Lestat de Lioncourt
Louis du Pointe du Lac
Claudia
Armand
Santiago

Book Two: The Vampire Lestat

'Ah, the taste and feel of blood when all passion and greed is sharpened in that one desire!'

"Lestat: a vampire - but very much not the conventional undead, for Lestat is the truly alive.  Lestat is vivid, ecstatic, stagestruck, and his extravagant story he plunges form the lascivious stews of eighteenth century Paris to the Rome of Augustus and the Britain of the Druids, from the demonic Egypt of pre-history, to  New Orleans, to the frenetic twentieth century world of rock superstardom - as, pursued by the living and the dead, he searches across the world and time for the secret of his own dark immortality"

This book tells us of:
"The Early Education And Adventures of The Vampire Lestat"
Part I - Lelio Rising
Part II - The Legacy of Magnus
Part III - Viaticum For The Marquise
Part IV - The Children of the Darkness
Part V - The Vampire Armand
Part VI - On The Devil's Road From Paris to Cairo
Part VII - Ancient Magic, Ancient Mysteries

Book Three: Queen of the Damned

"After 6000 years of horrifying stillness, Akasha, Mother of all vampires and the Queen of the Damned, has risen form her sleep to her loose the powers of the night.
But her monstrous plan for ruling the worlds of the living and the undead must be stopped before she destroys her vampire children and mankind, and it falls of the vampire Lestat to fight her all encompassing evil - for it is he who challenged her power by waking her from sleep."

PART I
THE ROAD TO THE VAMPIRE LESTAT
1. The Legend of the Twins
2. The Short Happy Life of Baby Jenks and the Fang Gang
3. The Goddess Pandora
4. The Story of Daniel, the Devil's Minion of the Boy from Interview with the Vampire
5. Khayman, my Khayman
6. The Story of Jesse, the Great Family, and the Talamasca

PART II
ALL HALLOWS EVE

PART III
AS IT WAS IN THE BEGINNING, IS NOW, AND EVER SHALL BE...
1. Lestat: In The Arms of the Goddess
2. Marius: Coming Together
3. Lestat: The Queen of Heaven
4. The story of the Twins, Part I
5. Lestat: This Is My Body, This Is My Blood
6. The story of the Twins, Part II
7. Lestat: The Kingdom of Heaven
8. The story of the Twins, Conclusion

PART IV
THE QUEEN OF THE DAMNED

PART V
...WORLD WITHOUT END, AMEN

Book Four: The Tale Of The Body Thief (1992)

"Vampire hero, rockstar and seducer of million, Lestat is an immortal extraordinaire...

But Lestat yearns to be reborn a mortal.  Tormented to the depths of his vampire soul he wanders aimlessly across the globe, from Amsterdam to the Amazon jungle, until he meets the one being who can grant him his wish.  He is the Body Thief, more sinister and evil than any .  But when Lestat surrenders his vampire body he discovers what he had so long ago forgotten: the awkwardness and anguish of being human..."

Book Four: Memnoch The Devil (1995)

"Lestat, perfect vampire and eternal rebel, so gifted for evil yet so drawn by goodness, seeking constantly to justify the nature he abhors, makes his most reckless challenge ever - to defy both God and the Devil!

Amid the luxury and decay of present day New York, Lestat chooses his victims with care, taking only those truly evil humans he can also love.  But his obsession with Roger, a sophisticated drug lord - whose beautiful and saintly Dora fascinates him even more - is plagued by the sense that Lestat, too, is being stalked, like one of his own victims.

In a momentous confrontation, Lestat is brought face to face with Memnoch, the Devil himself.  Infinitely more powerful, more terrifying, more dangerously seductive than any vampire, Memnoch whirls Lestat on an apocalyptic journey through time and space to the dawn of humankind, to fourteenth century Constantinople, Jerusalem in the days of Christ.  And to the very gates of Hell.

At the mercy of terrible forces and his own demons, Lestat will need more than the power of a holy relic, more even that Dora's unshakeable faith, if he is to be saved..."

Anne O'Brien Rice

Now, if after reading this, you are intrigued, may I make a suggestion to you?  Either borrow the books from your local library, a friend or even a member of your own family (providing that they possess the books themselves!) and read them.  Reading them one after the other is highly recommended.  At least you won't have to wait until the next volume is out!
 
 

Credits:
Interview with the Vampire
The Vampire Lestat
Queen of the Damned
Published by Futura

Tale of the Body Thief
Published by Penguin

Memnoch the Devil
Published by BCA by arrangement with Chatto & Windus Ltd