Blood and Gold (Vampire Chronicles)
by Anne Rice
List Price:
Our Price: $3.49
You Save: $4.50 (56%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Anne RiceEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2002-10-29
ISBN: 0345409329
Number of pages: 576
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of Blood and Gold (Vampire Chronicles)
Book Review: Marius seemed almost real
Summary: 5 Stars
Marius has always been an interesting character to me ever since I saw the movie Queen of the Damned and read the book The Vampire Lestat. Although I read parts of his life in the book, The Vampire Lestat I had an urgency to know more about him. It seemed as though Anne Rice had forgotten Marius; I once thought to myself how wonderful it would be if she had wrote a book about his life in the big picture. However, it turns out she already did.I finally had the book about the ledgendary vampire who is revered and known by most vampires. I had it right in my hands which was enthralling. This is my first time to review a product so bear with me please.
The Story of Marius is filled with adventures, wealth, relationships, adventure, pain, loss, vanity, and abandonment. His life from imperial rome to modern times reflects something that is truly undeniable and that is life.
Here is a man (or vampire) who lived his life for 2000 years, filled with many things most men (and women) wish to have; Wealth, Power, Fame, Love, and adventure. But ironically as it turns out, Marius, who still lives on in the novel,still lives a wretched life in the inside and that is a feeling of loneliness and abandonment as the result of a break-up with Pandora, Bianca, Lestat, Mael, Avicus, and Zenobia. But How does this reflect the theme of life? That life is not like other typical novels with solid plots and happy endings. Instead Life is filled with personal (and big) events that are important to one who bears it. This isn't really a typical story, but a story with an authentic components of life; Pain from loss, loneliness, and abandonment. Joy with those who he loved and loved him back. Regrets when someone leaves the other. Loneliness which makes one long for love and an intimate relationship than the wealth of the world. Challanges he faced in his life. To me the life of Marius seemed real enough to come alive. Although there is no solid plot in the life of marius, I would like to argue in the book's defense that there is no life with a solid plot but only experience which one longs to tell as if it was a tale to tell.
To listen to a story of Marius would be like getting to know him personally. To listen to his story, you are actually listening to one of the most powerful and ancient vampires there is in the world of Anne Rice. You are only discovering his immortal past filled with the things I have listed above.
It's true that the book didn't have both a satisfying ending and a relevant title (Blood and Gold) that doesn't relates to Marius (Perhaps if one reads the book carefully maybe the title could be understood well enough), which were the only things I didn't have much fond of. But for those who are curious to know Marius I strongly recommend you read this book and I hope you will have no regrets reading it for it is truly an appreciative experience.
Summary of Blood and Gold (Vampire Chronicles)
?RICE WRITES WITH HER USUAL EROTIC AND HISTORICALLY EVOCATIVE FLAIR.??People
Once a proud Senator in Imperial Rome, Marius is kidnapped and forced into that dark realm of blood, where he is made a protector of the Queen and King of the vampires?in whom the core of the supernatural race resides. Through his eyes we see the fall of pagan Rome to the Emperor Constantine, the horrific sack of the Eternal City at the hands of the Visigoths, and the vile aftermath of the Black Death. Ultimately restored by the beauty of the Renaissance, Marius becomes a painter, living dangerously yet happily among mortals, and giving his heart to the great master Botticelli, to the bewitching courtesan Bianca, and to the mysterious young apprentice Armand. But it is in the present day, deep in the jungle, when Marius will meet his fate seeking justice from the oldest vampires in the world. . . .
Time heals all wounds, unless, of course, you're a vampire. Cuts may heal, burns vanish, limbs reattach, but for the "blood god," the wounds of the heart sometimes stay open and raw for centuries. So it is for Marius, Anne Rice's oft-mentioned and beloved scholar. We've heard parts of his tale in past volumes of the Vampire Chronicles, but never so completely and never from his own lips. In Blood and Gold, Rice mostly (but not entirely) avoids the danger of treading worn ground as she fills out the life and character of Marius the Lonely, the Disenchanted, the Heartsick--a 2,000-year-old vampire "with all the conviction of a mortal man."
Plucked from his beloved Rome in the prime of his life and forced into solitude as keeper of the vampire queen and king, Marius has never forgiven the injustice of his mortal death. Thousands of years later, he still seethes over his losses. Immortality for Marius is both a blessing and a curse--he bears "witness to all splendid and beautiful things human," yet is unable to engage in relationships for fear of revealing his burden.
New readers to the Chronicles may wish for a more fleshed-out, less introspective hero, but Rice's legions of devoted fans will recognize Blood and Gold for what it is: a love song to Marius the Wanderer, whose story reveals the complexities and limitations of eternal existence. --Daphne Durham
Horror Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Horror Books
Let the Right One In: A Novelby John Ajvide Lindqvist
St. Martin's Griffin; Published: 2008-10-28; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.99
Price in other shops:
Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus: The 1818 Textby Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
University Of Chicago Press; Published: 1982-03-15; Paperback; Book
Best price: $11.00
Price in other shops:
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Oxford Bookworms S, Stage 4)by Robert Louis Stevenson
Oxford Univ Pr (Sd); Published: 1991-06; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.79
Price in other shops:
The Oxford Book of Gothic Tales (Oxford Books of Prose)Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2001-11-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $50.00
The Waste Lands (The Dark Tower, Book 3)by Stephen King
Penguin Audio; Published: 2003-08-26; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $149.99
![Thinner [UNABRIDGED] Image](/images/Thinner-UNABRIDGED-0140862668-X.jpg){kind=small}
Thinner [UNABRIDGED]by Stephen King
Penguin Audio; Published: 1996-09-01; Audio Cassette; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
The Crow: Temple of Nightby S P. Somtow
Harper Paperbacks; Published: 1999-11-03; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.99
Price in other shops:
Brains: A Zombie Memoirby Robin Becker
Eos; Published: 2010-05-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.23
Price in other shops:
The Strain LP: Book One of The Strain Trilogyby Guillermo Del Toro, Chuck Hogan
HarperLuxe; Published: 2009-06-02; Paperback; Book
Best price: $14.45
Price in other shops:
Prince of Darknessby Barbara Michaels
HarperTorch; Published: 2005-04-26; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.58
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 1996-03-31; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.75
Price in other shops:
The Witching Hour (Lives of the Mayfair Witches)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 1993-03-22; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.11
Price in other shops:
The Tale of the Body Thief (Vampire Chronicles)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 1997-12-13; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.90
Price in other shops:
Complete Vampire Chronicles (Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, The Queen of the Damned, The Tale of the body Thief)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 1993-09-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $16.00
Price in other shops:
Vittorio, the Vampireby Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 2001-02-27; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.09
Price in other shops:
Memnoch the Devil (Vampire Chronicles)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 1997-05-28; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.65
Price in other shops:
Blackwood Farm (The Vampire Chronicles, No. 8)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 2003-09-30; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.00
Price in other shops:
Merrick (Vampire/ Witches Chronicles)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 2001-10-02; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.64
Price in other shops:
Blood Canticle (The Vampire Chronicles)by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 2004-08-31; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.00
Price in other shops:
The Vampire Armand (The Vampire Chronicles) Book 6by Anne Rice
Ballantine Books; Published: 2000-10-03; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.99
Price in other shops: