One of my very first exposures to Anime came in the late 80’s and the wonderfully atmospheric Vampire Hunter D. Oh sure I had seen Robotech and Speed Racer and the like, but this was truly unlike anything I had ever seen before. Dark Horse Press and Digital Manga Publishing have joined together to bring the fantastic Vampire Hunter D novels to American audiences for the first time. Originally written some 20 years ago by Hideyuki Kikuchi, “Tale of the Dead Town” is thus far the fourth book in the series to be released.
As the story opens, D comes upon a lone biker out on the frontier defending an injured teenaged girl in what remains of her family’s RV from a flock of Dragons. Only D’s intervention saves the pair but the girl, Lori Knight, is badly injured, and her parents are killed. Along with the biker, Pluto, D leads them to a great city that hovers several feet off the ground on a large disk. D has been hired by the mayor of the town to seek out and destroy the vampire that attacked his daughter. Lori’s suffered radiation poisoning causing her to lose her hearing and speech. D soon finds out that Lori and her family once lived in this floating town but left recently.
D finds that the Knight’s old house has been locked up tightly by the town’s sheriff, but D manages to get inside and finds a secret laboratory that lori’s parents used. And he also encounters something else…a shadowy shape that quickly flees from the Hunter. D is hardly welcomed by the townspeople who consider the dhampir to be just as much of a threat as any other vampire. Soon a body turns up, completely drained of blood. Everyone believes it is obviously the work of the vampire and yet an investigation of the body shows no bite mark at all. And yet, not longer after the body is buried, it rises from the grave, intent on killing D.
D now finds himself not only hunting a vampire, but also trying to solve the mystery of how the man turned into a vampire without being bitten. And what is the secret to the experiments the Knights were working on and why did they flee the safe haven of the town.
Tale of the Dead Town is much like the D anime, more of an adventure story with horror elements to it. In the postscript to the story, Kikuchi talks about how he was influenced, in particular by the Hammer Dracula films and Christopher Lee. This is reflected in his writing although the character of D is vastly powerful and you really get the feeling that not much can challenge this avenger of the night. Tale of the Dead Town skillfully wove both a horror and a mystery tale and sprinkled it with liberal action scenes to make for one heck of a enjoyable story. Kikuchi’s prose is quite colorful and descriptive. It’s a quick read at 167 pages and as a bonus the first chapter of the next book, “The Stuff of Dreams” is included as a preview.
– Tim Janson
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
