Bestselling author Matt Haig brings us "red-blooded fiction at its most seductive" (Sunday Telegraph) with his clever, entertaining story of a vampire family trying to understand their bloodthirsty nature. On a leafy street in the quiet village of Bishopthorpe there lives a very ordinary and averagely dysfunctional happy family. Peter Radley is the village doctor, and his wife Helen is part of the local book club. Their children, Clara and Rowan, may be experiencing all the hormonal anguish of being teenagers . . . but that ...
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Bestselling author Matt Haig brings us "red-blooded fiction at its most seductive" (Sunday Telegraph) with his clever, entertaining story of a vampire family trying to understand their bloodthirsty nature. On a leafy street in the quiet village of Bishopthorpe there lives a very ordinary and averagely dysfunctional happy family. Peter Radley is the village doctor, and his wife Helen is part of the local book club. Their children, Clara and Rowan, may be experiencing all the hormonal anguish of being teenagers . . . but that's only a normal part of growing up. However, Peter and Helen have kept from the children a life-changing family secret. One night, when Clara finds herself driven to committing a bloodthirsty act of violence, her parents react with resignation rather than horror. Peter and Helen must now explain things to their children: why it is that their skin is so sensitive to sunlight, why they all find garlic so repulsive, why Clara's recent decision to go vegan has been so detrimental to her health . . . and other disadvantages of being a family of abstaining vampires. Reeling from their parents' revelation, and with the police closing in, Clara and Rowan are stunned by the further discovery that they also have an uncle, a smooth-talking and decidedly active vampire who has been kept away from them all their lives. But when he swoops into the village to save the day, he unleashes a host of shadowy and even darker secrets that will bring the whole Radley family either to reconciliation and readjustment . . . or to self-destruction.
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A fantastic read. I appreciate the alternate view of how a family of vampires would live within a small suburban town & suppress their natural tendencies so they could live a normal middle class life. I enjoyed the comparisons between each family member & how each one handled their own differently.
gelati.giovanni@gmail.com
Dec 28, 2010
Gelati's Scoop
I am not a big vampire guy and really don?t read that much of the genre. My saying anything about this being a typical vampire novel would be incorrect and impolite. What this novel is though, is just plain flat out fun and a very good read. The Radleys try to be the every neighbor, the middle of the road couple, the average family, but they are anything but that; they are abstaining vampires. Fun, frivolity, family soap opera, fast paced action are what is found in the pages penned by Matt Haig. Check it out:
?Meet the Radleys
Peter, Helen and their teenage children, Clara and Rowan, live in an English town. They are an everyday family, averagely dysfunctional, averagely content. But as their children have yet to find out, the Radleys have a devastating secret
From one of Britain?s finest young novelists comes a razor-sharp unpicking of adulthood and family life. In this moving, thrilling and extraordinary portrait of one unusual family, The Radleys ask what we grow into when we grow up, and explores what we gain ? and lose ? when we deny our appetites. ?
The novel for me was, well novel, right from the very beginning. The background information on vampires and abstaining was really cute and different. The whole direction the novel took was a departure from anything I have read recently. Issues of all sorts were delved into and fleshed out here in the Radleys: Family values, teen bullying, peer pressure, selfishness, fidelity. Check me if I am wrong, but I thought this was a vampire novel.
I had the pleasure of finishing this novel during the snowstorm that blew through here on Sunday. I don?t know if that elevated my mood while I read it or not, but the novel built pressure right to the very end and then Matt Haig tied everything up with a nice tight bow and left nothing dangling or blowing in the wind. Would I suggest this novel to anyone, I am right now. The Radleys rocks, I don?t hesitate to pass this around to my wife and children; it is just that entertaining. Do not abstain from this novel; it could lead to withdraw symptoms, blotchiness, skin irritation, low tolerance to sunlight, fatigue and sleeplessness.
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