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You ever get like one or two chapters into a book by a new-to-you author and then immediately slam “add to cart” for more of that author’s work?

That’s one of the best feelings, I think. And that’s what happened to me shortly after starting Gwendolyn Kiste’s RELUCTANT IMMORTALS (the other book I ordered was THE RUST MAIDENS, which I’m hoping to read really soon!)

There was something about this book that drew me in right away, completely. This book manages to be dreamy & haunting & angry & funny & weird & & & …yeah, this is one of my favorite reads of the year so far, no doubt.

It’s been about twenty years since I read DRACULA, and I’ve never read JANE EYRE, so while the two main characters in RELUCTANT IMMORTALS are characters from those two classic novels, it was easier for me to approach them as characters I had only just met.

Lucy Westenra is a vampire, one of Dracula’s first victims. It’s 1967, and her and Bee (a character from JANE EYRE) are living together in Los Angeles. It’s clear they move around quite a bit, being immortal and all.

Lucy has Dracula’s ashes in an assortment of urns. She keeps them separate from each other, hiding them & burying them, in a desperate effort to keep Dracula from regaining physical form. There’s a lot of incredibly dark/bleak humor in RELUCTANT IMMORTALS, and it occasionally stems from an almost slapsticky vibe regarding Dracula’s ashes & urns. That said, keeping those ashes contained & keeping Dracula from harming others is a task that Lucy takes deathly serious.

There’s a somber, sad quality to this story, but there’s also this bright undercurrent of hope that runs through everything. Lucy and Bee have suffered greatly at the hands of abusive men, and this is a story about them trying to find their way through the fog of all that trauma and carve out a space for themselves.

There’s a griminess to Kiste’s depiction of Los Angeles, and a general theme of decay overall. The vibe is most definitely gothic, but with a groovy/neon-drenched backdrop. There’s almost a playful meta quality to this story, as Lucy & Bee exist in our world, with the different films depicting their stories always there to remind them of their abusers.

But then again, those movies aren’t their stories. They were afforded only minor character status by those movies, and this book is kind of a big Fuck You to that.

I just…loved RELUCTANT IMMORTALS so goddamn much. It’s an incredibly evocative & beautifully written novel, haunting, humorous, and moody as fuck. There’s also a really heartachey sapphic romance subplot that I loved. Oof…this is such a gorgeous book.

Endless thanks to Saga Press for sending a copy my way!!