cover image Saint's Vigil

Saint's Vigil

Bryan Phoenix. Sigil/Crawlspace, $19.99 trade paper (408p) ISBN 978-1941606995

Phoenix's debut swings perilously between the brutality of a snuff film and the piety of an evangelical tract. Hugh, a tough cop with a heart of gold, is determined to avenge his fellow cops' deaths by taking down a family of mass-murdering vampires. Saundra, a vaguely religious single mother of two, must fight the corruption of her soul after being bitten. Fans of gory B-movie horror may find entertainment in the action sequences filled with mutilated throats and roasted corpses. Those with more delicate stomachs may not make it far enough to discover the bizarre dialogue, half in thick dialect and half woodenly straightforward, or the classically literal deus ex machina that forms the book's climax. Phoenix's vampires represent all of humanity's "lost" bad habits, which may explain why his bland heroes are devoid of any compelling flaws. The bad guys don't have real motives or interesting characterization either, reading more as haphazard conglomerations of nasty deeds. Phoenix has a good point to make about the glamour of corruption in our society, but it's lost in an inconsistent, preachy narrative populated by dull characters. (Sept.)