 First print edition | |
| Author | David Wellington |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Barbara Sturman |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | David Wellington's Vampire series |
| Genre | Horror |
| Publisher | brokentype (online) Three Rivers Press (print) |
Publication date | August 2006 (online) |
| Media type | ebook |
| Pages | 336 |
| ISBN | 0-307-38143-9 |
| OCLC | 76166945 |
| 813/.6 22 | |
| LC Class | PS3623.E468 A613 2007 |
| Followed by | 99 Coffins |
13 Bullets is a vampire novel by David Wellington, published in serial online in March, 2006.
13 Bullets takes place in Pennsylvania in the year 2003, in a setting similar to the real world, but where vampires and other supernatural forces are rare but accepted phenomena. It is widely believed that vampires were all but wiped out twenty years ago by Special Deputy Jameson Arkeley. The last vampire still in existence, Justinia Malvern, long imprisoned in a nearly abandoned sanitarium, has somehow managed to bestow her vampiric curse to the outside world and is working to free herself of human confinement. Pennsylvania State Trooper Laura Caxton is assigned to assist Arkeley hunt down the vampires running loose in rural Pennsylvania.
 | This section possibly contains original research .(March 2010) |
The vampires in David Wellington's novel seem to lose all their human appearances once turned. Their ears become pointed, their hair falls out, all teeth become wickedly sharp, and skin color always becomes pale white, regardless of ethnicity and pigmentation in life. The vampire must remain in a coffin during the day, as their bodies literally die each sunrise, and flesh melts into a noxious fluid, with dead skin and maggots. They are put together when dusk comes, thus getting a new body at night. Physical damage, such as mangled ears, is repaired each morning, but atrophy due to blood-starvation is not.
The method of transferring the curse is very different from the "traditional" way. To transfer the curse one must accept the vampire's invitation to undeath, and then kill one's self to be reborn.
Vampires also have the power to resurrect their victims from the dead to create undead servants. These "half-deads" quickly decay, and thus have weak and fragile bodies. In one scene, Arkeley tells Caxton, that the half-deads are "cowards" and are very easily frightened, though they seem to stand their ground despite massive casualties in later encounters. In combat, they typically use knives and other hand-to-hand weapons, as their hand-eye coordination is too poor to properly use firearms.
Vampires are nearly unstoppable. They exhibit increased speed and vastly enhanced physical strength (enough to twist open a steel padlock using bare hands). As long as they have a supply of blood, they can heal grievous wounds, including massive brain injuries, in seconds. The only way to kill one is by destroying the heart, which is protected by an area of steel-hard skin. The vampire is weakest when it regurgitates blood - usually to feed another vampire - and can potentially be killed with a single shot at this moment. Arkeley himself uses a Glock .23 with cross-pointed bullets, which fragment within the target's body. It is suggested that a vampire with reserves of consumed blood in its body may be able to heal damage to its heart in time to prevent its death.
Unlike most traditional vampires, Wellington's vampires do age to a degree, with the result that their need for blood increases significantly as their body decays over time; the oldest vampire in the series, at over three centuries of age, has reached a point where she will allegedly require five to six gallons of blood just to walk on her own, with younger vampires taking on the responsibility of 'feeding' their elders by bringing them blood.
13 Bullets was printed in book form in 2007 by Three Rivers Press.
13 Bullets has gathered mostly positive reviews from horror fans. Flamesrising.com called the novel a “modern action adventure with deadly vampires, great writing and a few clever plot twists”. [1] Revish stated that Wellington's work was “a worthy addition to an overcrowded genre”. [2]
A vampire is a mythical creature that subsists by feeding on the vital essence of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead creatures that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deaths in the neighbourhoods which they inhabited while they were alive. They wore shrouds and were often described as bloated and of ruddy or dark countenance, markedly different from today's gaunt, pale vampire which dates from the early 19th century. Vampiric entities have been recorded in cultures around the world; the term vampire was popularized in Western Europe after reports of an 18th-century mass hysteria of a pre-existing folk belief in Southeastern and Eastern Europe that in some cases resulted in corpses being staked and people being accused of vampirism. Local variants in Southeastern Europe were also known by different names, such as shtriga in Albania, vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania.
I Am Legend is a 1954 post-apocalyptic horror novel by American writer Richard Matheson that was influential in the modern development of zombie and vampire literature and in popularizing the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to disease. The novel was a success and was adapted into the films The Last Man on Earth (1964), The Omega Man (1971), and I Am Legend (2007). It was also an inspiration for George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968).
Vampire literature covers the spectrum of literary work concerned principally with the subject of vampires. The literary vampire first appeared in 18th-century poetry, before becoming one of the stock figures of gothic fiction with the publication of Polidori's The Vampyre (1819), which was inspired by the life and legend of Lord Byron. Later influential works include the penny dreadful Varney the Vampire (1847); Sheridan Le Fanu's tale of a lesbian vampire, Carmilla (1872), and the most well known: Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897). Some authors created a more "sympathetic vampire", with Varney being the first, and more recent examples such as Moto Hagio's series The Poe Clan (1972-1976) and Anne Rice's novel Interview with the Vampire (1976) proving influential.
Anita Blake is the title and viewpoint character of the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series by Laurell K. Hamilton. The series takes place in a parallel world in which supernatural characters like vampires and werewolves exist alongside regular humans, with Blake's jobs including the re-animation of the dead as well as the hunting and executing of supernatural creatures that have broken the law. Hamilton stated that she created the character after perceiving a gender inequality in detective fiction, with female characters rarely getting the same treatment as male heroes of the genre.
Robert Lawrence Stine, sometimes known as Jovial Bob Stine and Eric Affabee, is an American novelist, short story writer, television producer, screenwriter, and executive editor.
Wilhelmina "Mina" Harker is a fictional character and the main female character in Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula.
The Curse of the Werewolf is a 1961 British horror film based on the novel The Werewolf of Paris by Guy Endore. The film was made by the British company Hammer Film Productions and was shot at Bray Studios on sets that were constructed for the proposed Spanish inquisition themed The Rape of Sabena, a film that was shelved when the BBFC objected to the script. While the original story took place in Paris, the location of the film was moved to Madrid to avoid building new Parisian sets. The leading part of the werewolf was Oliver Reed's first starring role in a film and composer Benjamin Frankel's score is notable for its use of twelve-tone serialism, rare in film music. It was also the first werewolf film to be shot in color.
Point Horror is a series of young adult horror fiction books. The series was most popular among teenaged girls.
Commander USA's Groovie Movies is an American movie showcase series that ran weekend afternoons on the USA Network.
Dracula is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. He is based on the vampire Count Dracula from the novel of the same name by author Bram Stoker. After the initial run of the series The Tomb of Dracula, the character has been depicted primarily as an antagonist to superheroes in the Marvel Universe.
David Wellington is an American writer of horror fiction, best known for his Zombie trilogy. He also writes science fiction as D. Nolan Clark.
This is an alphabetical listing of members of the Vampire Council and their followers in Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series of novels.
Frostbite is a horror novel by American writer David Wellington, published in serial online in July, 2006 and in print in 2009.
Count Dracula is the title character of Bram Stoker's 1897 gothic horror novel Dracula. He is considered the prototypical and archetypal vampire in subsequent works of fiction. Aspects of the character are believed by some to have been inspired by the 15th-century Wallachian prince Vlad the Impaler, who was also known as Vlad Dracula, and by Sir Henry Irving, an actor for whom Stoker was a personal assistant.
99 Coffins is a 2007 vampire novel written by David Wellington. It is a sequel to 2006's Thirteen Bullets.
Eric Northman is a fictional character in The Southern Vampire Mysteries, a series of thirteen books written by New York Times bestselling author Charlaine Harris. He is a vampire, slightly over one thousand years old, and is first introduced in the first novel, Dead Until Dark and appears in all subsequent novels. Since the book series is told from the first person perspective of Sookie Stackhouse, what readers perceive of his character is influenced by what Sookie comprehends. HBO's television series True Blood is based on this book series and the character of Eric Northman is portrayed somewhat differently. A list of True Blood characters has a detailed description of Eric's character from the TV show.
23 Hours is a 2009 vampire novel written by David Wellington. It is a sequel to 2008's Vampire Zero.
Vampire Zero is a 2008 vampire novel written by David Wellington.
Curse of the Undead is a 1959 American horror Western film directed by Edward Dein and starring Eric Fleming, Michael Pate and Kathleen Crowley.
Overwinter (2010) is a horror novel by American writer David Wellington. It is the sequel to his previous werewolf novel Frostbite, though this novel is only available in print; it was not first published online like some of his other novels.
