Rhinehoth - Centuries ago a great castle was built in the mountains of Germany's Black Forest. Its ancient guardians still thrive in its walls forever protecting its dark secrets, holding captive an enemy that threatens their very existence. Foretold is a story of an ancient warrior that is to return to the castle to free the captive Vampire Prince. Simon Roberts was a petty thief who fled England to escape Scotland Yard after a series of unsuccessful jewelry store… (more)
Rhinehoth - Centuries ago a great castle was built in the mountains of Germany's Black Forest. Its ancient guardians still thrive in its walls forever protecting its dark secrets, holding captive an enemy that threatens their very existence. Foretold is a story of an ancient warrior that is to return to the castle to free the captive Vampire Prince. Simon Roberts was a petty thief who fled England to escape Scotland Yard after a series of unsuccessful jewelry store heists. He was recruited to do a job in Germany where he was to simply drive the getaway car while providing a look out. He thought this was going to be an easy job and a way to break into the German crime scene. But things go terribly wrong and he ended up being the only survivor of the botched heist. Simon is quickly sentenced to a prison called Rhinehoth. This is where Germany sent the worst of the worst, surely not a place for a petty thief such as himself. Rhinehoth is a great German castle that was converted in the late 1930's to a Stalag for war criminals of World War II. The converted prison's modern day inhabitants are relentlessly tortured, starved and sleep deprived. This contributes to the prisoners' delusional visions that help hide the truth and keeps Rhinehoth's secrets. Their captors are the army of Werewolves who have survived the centuries off the very flesh and blood of Germany's worst forgotten criminals. Simon, imprisoned becomes plagued with visions from his subconscious ancient past with confusion of his modern day consciousness. He discovers through his visions that he is the ancient warrior, Guthrie who has come to free the Vampire Prince and all the captives while saving the world from a dark plan of biblical proportions that has been orchestrated over the centuries!
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Sat, 20 Mar 2010 22:17:47 +0100
As a great fan of gothic I’ve always been eager to be introduced to new books but these days I’ve become quite disappointed and sceptical about new publications.
I came across this book with the help of a friend, or rather by his recommendation, he told me I’d be thrilled to read it no matter how much crap I’ve come across in the last years. So, with a little doubt I opened the book and read it. AND found it absolutely thrilling, indeed!!
Rhinehoth is not a story about a battle between… (more)
As a great fan of gothic I’ve always been eager to be introduced to new books but these days I’ve become quite disappointed and sceptical about new publications.
(less)I came across this book with the help of a friend, or rather by his recommendation, he told me I’d be thrilled to read it no matter how much crap I’ve come across in the last years. So, with a little doubt I opened the book and read it. AND found it absolutely thrilling, indeed!!
Rhinehoth is not a story about a battle between vampires and werewolves, on the contrary, I rarely found a gothic book that would turn so much away from the mainstream vampire vs. werewolf plotline without going to extremes. The ’racial’ conflict we can find in most contemporary gothic books is replaced here by a conflict rooted in a greater cause. An intended union between the two races is sought by the vampire in order to free the invaded country and form a national identity.
In my opinion, the conflict lies in the problem that comes with the realisation of all great causes and ideologies, which is the individuals’ craving for power, may it be human, vampire or werewolf. I see incest, loyalty, betrayal, hidden identities.
Simon, the protagonist, has the role to solve the conflict without knowing who he really is and was and what could possibly be behind the facts and truths he is faced with and cannot understand.
I also liked the visions aspect. He constantly has dreams and waking vision of the seductive bloodsucker heroine and also of his memories of recent and ancient past. These dreams and visions and his exploring the hidden secrets of the most extraordinary castle prison give him singns that help him find his way in the mental mist. This aspect gives the book a thrilling detective storyline also, which I really enjoyed.
Crucial roles, however, are taken by the heroine and the castle itself! Maxime’s centuries long secret scientific achievements and failures turn the castle into a kind of flesh and blood machine for self-preservation that would scare the hell out of Victor Frankenstein and make contemporary readers freeze with shock by its possibility for present day realisation. It did scare the hell out of me!
The characters surprise each other and even themselves throughout the story, which gives an atmosphere of uncertainty to the book and always faced me with doors of interpretation opening and closing all the time and maintained a tension which filled me with excitement and urged me to go on with reading.
The gothic horroristic atmosphere is casually combined with a sense of humour provided by Simon’s constant self irony. Although the book presents bloodshed and sexual visions, I did not find them too dominant that would destroy high quality, these are there in the book in the right measure proving the author to be an author of novel rather than a cheap blood and porn heck writer that I am forced to get used to nowadays.
The book also has a historical aspect, which is connected to the great cause, carrying the idea through hundreds of years, from the Roman Empire to the present day, with numerous references to the Hitler regime, questioning a universal ideology so much familiar to the cotemporary readers like me. This is an excellent and well written story that remains in the field of the gothic in a classic and modern way at the same time and has a great potential for a trilogy. I can’t wait for book 2!