V-Wars: Blood & Fire: a Chronicle of the Vampire Wars - review

Editor: Jonathan Maberry

First published: 2014

Contains spoilers

The blurb: When anyone can turn.

When every street is a war zone.

Our world will burn.

Our world will bleed.

There is nowhere to run!

It's been one year since a virus triggered junk DNA and people all over the world started changing. Becoming something else. Craving blood.

It's been 10 months since the word "vampire" stopped being something from old monster stories and Hollywood movies.

It's been six months since our world and theirs erupted into war.

It's been two months since an uneasy peace was signed.

It's been one hour says that peace was shattered.

War is here again.

The Vampire War.

The review: Regular readers will know that I thoroughly enjoyed the first V-Wars volume and also enjoyed the first V-Wars graphic novel, though admittedly less so than the prose. For those unaware of the series, V-Wars is set in a world where a virus, released from ice drilling, has activated junk DNA in certain people around the world mutating than into vampires. There are a whole range of vampires dependent on genetic background. Indeed in this volume we discover that in this world they have seen and 92 species, including 18 subtypes not in literature. Folklorist Luther Swann postulates that could leave nearly 200 species from folklore as possible new species and further hybrids are possible beyond this.

Like the first volume, this volume is made up of short stories by different authors set in the universe and interspersed between each other. The writing is tight throughout, and the stories entertaining. As somewhat of a vampire geek part of the joy is the wide variety of vampire types used, although purists who prefer their vampires Slavic may be a little disappointed. In this volume I noted the following vampire types: draugr, kyonsi, a snake vampire whose species is not named (but the character has featured in both volumes), upor, cihuateteo, mandurugo (with aswang mentioned in passing), craqueuhhe, neuntöter (which are said to be covered in pustules containing pathogens, making them a plague carrier), nelapsi (with alp mentioned in passing) and kallikantzaros.

Werewolves do feature in this, but as a creature born of the ice virus it is suggested they are a subspecies of vampire. In the V-Wars universe the humans had only come across a few werewolves including a loup garou, and were hunting a vampire killing werewolf serial killer of another variety. Swann does list folklore variants including vampire/werewolf hybrids such as the pryccolitch or the Haitian loogaroo, who were said to be witches that shed their skins at night to become vampire/werewolf hybrids. Others mentioned are the mjertovjec (said to become a vampire on death), the lobishomen and the farkaskoldus.

Whilst many vampires in the V-Wars universe are blood drinkers or flesh eaters the broader definition is a person who has an abnormal need to feed on one of several vital substances including energy. I liked the explanation of the mandurugo being thought to split in half due to their excellent chameleon-like skills, thus only revealing part of themselves to attack.

As I intimated earlier this is a superb volume, as good as the first volume. I do like the short story style breaking the book into vignettes. This could easily translate itself into episodes for a TV series or chapters in a portmanteau film. I think there is perhaps also room for dedicated single focused novels. That, of course, is a fan boy’s wish list, and for now I'll happily sit and wait for the next V-Wars volume. 9 out of 10.

V-Wars – review

Editor: Jonathon Maberry

First Published: 2013

Contains spoilers

The Blurb: They are already here.

They hide among us.

They hunt us.

They feed on us.

They ARE us.

V-Wars is the chronicle of the first Vampire War. From the savage murders committed by the patient zero of the plague to full-out battles with vampire terrorist cells, these are the stories of the most terrifying war mankind has ever faced!

The review: With a comic book currently available and a potential TV series, I thought it time I finally got around to V-Wars. The original book is a collection of shorts edited by (and contributed to by) Jonathon Maberry but the authors all had a common world and backstory to stick to. This backstory is shown to us by Maberry in a story entitled Junk. In Junk a b movie actor named Michael Fayne starts having blackouts. Fayne was patient zero for a flu virus known as ice flu (or I1V1), one that had been trapped in ice and released through global warming and that Fayne had contracted whilst filming on location in Alaska.

The blackouts occur as Fayne mutates, the virus causing junk DNA to activate and turn him into a vampire – he is caught because of the trail of decimated bodies he leaves behind but, of course, he is only the first. I would suggest that there is nothing supernatural about the vampires in V-Wars but that wouldn’t be strictly true. Whilst they are mutated individuals, and living rather than undead, they take on the vampiric form that their ancestry correlates with. We get a wurdulac, the woman being of Russian extraction, who can only feed on those she cares for and can turn victims, we get a snake vampire, we get a Jiangshi (Kyonsi) who has to do stretches each day to stop his tendons from becoming taut (the kyonsi is drawn folklore accurately; covered in white hair and has a monster face) and a Hsi-Hsue-Kuei that takes the form of a green haired ogre. Essentially every vampire type is catered for in this universe. As well as this some turn into Loup-Garou and others more traditional werewolves that are natural enemies of the vampires.

The transformations I mentioned (that do obey the law of mass and thus the mass remains constant) seem more supernatural (or praeternatural at least). When it comes to feeds we have similar. Whilst the wurdulac’s feeding seems almost a hard-wired psychological imperative, the kyonsi’s energy draining ability is again much more supernatural. The majority of vampires are blood drinkers, however, though some are flesh eaters and many have a need for human blood/flesh specifically.

Many of the stories are split into parts and the stories intermingle as we jump to just before the V-event to sometime after. We see the reaction of Government, US Homeland Security and the electorate. We see towns become lawless, or controlled by gangs. What we don’t see, I don’t believe, is all out war – but we see the start of such an event and the universe really does have legs enough to go on and on.

There isn't a bad story in the collection, and there isn’t any bad prose. It is all crisp, powerful stuff. Some of the vampires do become guilt-ridden but others revel in their condition. The only real shame of this volume is the time it has taken me to get to it. It is highly recommended and makes me really look forward to the release of the graphic trade paperback and the potential TV series. 9 out of 10.