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Thursday, 22 August 2019

The Vampire Genevieve series, Reading Order


I'm one of those people who wants to read things precisely in order and so the (somewhat) convoluted Vampire Genevieve series gave me a bit of a headache. For your benefit I set down the Chronological Reading Order, which follows the events exactly one after the other, below, and further down on the page, my actual recommended Reading order, together with my reasons for having this one be different than the Chronological.




The Chronological Order
  1.  Drachenfels, the 30 page +/- prologue: the book-end of 'The Quest for Constant Drachenfels'
  2.  Red Thirst (Silver Nails): Genevieve and Vukotich and the Great Escape
  3.  No Gold in The Grey mountains (Silver Nails): Lady Melissa and the ruin of Drachenfels
  4.  The Ignorant Armies (Silver Nails):  Johann and Vukotich in the North
  5.  Drachenfels, the Main of the novel: Detlef Sierck and Genevieve and the play of Drachenfels
  6.  Beasts in Velvet: Harald Kleindeinst and the case of The Beast
  7.  Stage Blood (Genevieve undead): Detlef and Genevieve and the Phantom of the Opera
  8.  The Warhawk (Silver Nails): Harald Kleindeinst and another killer
  9.  The Cold Stark House (Genevieve Undead): Genevieve and the Endless Play
  10.  Unicorn Ivory (Genevieve Undead): Genevieve and the Family Drama
  11.  The Ibby the Fish factor (Silver Nails): Detlef and Genevieve and the end of the line
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However, the reading order for the entire series I'd recommend is a little different from this one:


Recommended Reading Order

     I'd start with The Ignorant Armies as that one stands alone quite well.
Next I'd go with Red Thirst as Vukotich will be the connecting thread that'll introduce you to Genevieve, and the story will also make reference to the ending to the Quest of Oswald and its successful completion, which will slowly hype up your interest in the Drachenfels storyline.
     The third to read will be No Gold in the Grey Mountains short story, which will subvert your expectations somewhat (though depending on the reader, this might be a bad thing, or a good thing), while introducing you to both the environs of Drachenfels and the character of Lady Melissa, who, though she isn't that important, she will be immediately present upon the start of Drachenfels proper and will have an emotional bond with Genevieve, which you, as a reader of the No Gold short story, will al have.
     Then, naturally the Drachenfels novel, followed by the Stage Blood novella.
     I'd advise not immediately continuing into the Cold Stark House short story as, though it follows Genevieve, is a bit of a confusing and almost soulless continuation of her story line. Following on from the superb Stage Blood, it can not be anything but a let-down. It's best to make the side-venture into Beasts in Velvet first, as it is a magnificent novel, though it isn't a Genevieve novel per se (but then that's actually a plus since reading Cold Stark House next would be a bad idea), then followed by the Warhawk short story. Both follow Harald Kleindienst and  Rosanna as they solve crimes.
     The Warhawk's ending is a little abrupt but this'll be a good opportunity to go ahead with the Genevieve storyline and to plunge on into the Cold Stark House story. When that misadventure has been dealt with, prepare for an uptick in quality, and a return to the feeling of Red Thirst, the lady Vampire teamed up with an unwilling ally, in Unicorn Ivory.
     Then, to round it all off, with a good ending and happy feelings, comes the Ibby The Fish Factor.

To reiterate, without a wall of text:

  1.  Ignorant Armies (Silver Nails)
  2.  Red Thirst (Silver Nails)
  3.  No Gold In The Grey Mountains (Silver Nails)
  4.  Drachenfels
  5.  Stage Blood (Genevieve Undead)
  6.  Beasts in Velvet
  7.  The Warhawk (Silver Nails)
  8.  The Cold Stark House (Genevieve undead)
  9.  Unicorn Ivory (Genevieve Undead)
  10.  The Ibby the Fish Factor (Silver Nails)

6 and 7 could possibly be left out if you want to just read about Genevieve but, really, you'd be missing out.

And that puts to rest my extended look at Newman's classic horror series.
A very good addition to the Warhammer Horror imprint.

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Small note:

These books were written in a time where the spirit of adventure was paramount, and the original writers liked to put in references to the works of the authors they shared their little sandbox with. As such there are references to Steve Baxter's The Star Boat, The Tilean Rat, The Wolf Riders and likely a bunch of others.

And there are also a bunch of references, flat-out or oblique, to larger works: David Ferring's Konrad trilogy, Brian Craig's Orfeo trilogy and William King's Gotrek and Felix series. It is of course not necessary to read any of these if you enjoy or enjoyed the Genevieve series.




2 comments:

  1. A good precursor to all these would be the short story, “The Magician’s Son”, which features a much younger Vukotich. The story was written by none other than legendary science fiction author Barrington J. Bayley, who, to my knowledge, only ever wrote one other book for GW (the “Eye of Terror”, an early – and very trippy – W40k novel). This early look at a young Vukotich only appeared once in White Dwarf #186 (from April 1991), and it’s a real shame it has has never been republished because it's easily one of the better WH Fantasy shorts (no surprise given the pedigree of its author).

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    1. That's actually really neat! It's a shame that the earliest issue of white dwarf I have is like a 100 issues after that. There's some great short writings here and there.

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