It’s about alienation, of waking up powerful but not knowing why, of being in danger for reasons you can’t remember that shouldn’t matter. Shori’s story is not about her appearance. TBH, I think both of those takes are getting it wrong. I’ve had some awkward conversations about this book focused on either pedophilia or hypersexualization of Black girls. Butler wrote diverse communities well, and this book is no exception.Īll in all, this sounds like a good story, right?īut what if I tell you that despite being 53 and not human, Shori resembles a 10-year-old Black girl? Some of the best scenes in the book are the little life vignettes that Shori shares with her young human harem. Of course, she is a vampire, which means she has to build a community of human blood donors who are sexually and emotionally connected to her. Shori is the only one left, and her life depends on relearning her people’s ways and figuring out who wants her dead, and why.

Someone has been trying to kill her and her family, and they’ve nearly succeeded.

Instead of an impossibly sexy and immoral huntress, our title vampire is Shori, a compassionate 53-year-old vampire with amnesia trying to solve a mystery. The book is about vampires, but stays pretty far away from the usual cliches. If they’re lucky, it’s just one book or part of a book.įledgling has been called Butler’s vampire novel, and that’s not wrong. Every author has something in their catalog that gives readers of the future the ick.

Octavia butler vampire