Presidents' Day Review of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

This book is amazing. I can't explain to you how much I love this book. Compared to Seth Grahame-Smith's other book, Pride & Prejudice & Zombies, this is an exceptional tale of American history twisted on its ear, although the life and grandeur of Abraham Lincoln is treated with great care to historical detail and respect to the man himself. Unlike the first book, PP&Z, this tale of our president as a vampire hunter is a complete work of historical fiction. Pride & Prejudice & Zombies,  Grahame-Smith just added zombies and modified some of Austen's original text to include the gruesome undead monsters. I read it and honestly I enjoyed it, but I felt that he seemed restricted by the fact he was working with an established work that is a literary classic. 


However, with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Grahame-Smith was able to let his creative juices flow. If you are a history buff or are really into the Civil War, you will love this book. I am a big Civil War person, and I adore Mr. Lincoln, so at first I was a little hesitant to read it, given my mediocre reaction to PP&Z. But with the historical research and eye for detail that is reserved for history books or biographies, Grahame-Smith accomplishes something with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter that few historical fictions  splicing monsters into the tale have done: Made it freaking believable. 


It starts with a man in a dead end job in a dead end town, a struggling writer who was in a deep funk, meeting a strange and mysterious man who hands him a satchel of old texts, journals, and papers that were from Abraham Lincoln. Our downtrodden man is skeptical of the authenticity of these papers, brushing the mystery man off as a loon who has nothing better to do. Upon receiving this package, the mysterious man meets with the man and shows him things that we are not clued in on, but these sights and things that the man is shown makes him believe what the mystery man had said. As the man digs through the papers and journal, he discovers a frightening new history that had been kept from the world for centuries. 


Vampires of are real. And Abraham Lincoln hunted them. 


Our downtrodden writer begins the daunting task of sorting through the papers and putting together a new biography of the 16th President of the United States of America. He takes over a year to compile this new truth, and what comes out of it is an amazingly touching and gripping tale of arguably our favorite president. Starting Abe's life from young boy with the death of his mother and his struggle to grow up in an ever increasingly dangerous world, we start to see where the vampires entered young Abe's life from the beginning. The death of his mother, an actual event that shaped Abe, is attributed to a vampire landlord who poisoned Mrs. Lincoln after Mr. Lincoln couldn't pay back his loans. After discovering the truth of his mother's death, and the fact vampires exist, Abe vows to kill every vampire he comes across to avenge his mother. In between school and work to make money for the family, Abe hones his skills to kill the monsters with his ax he uses to chop firewood. He gets pretty good at chopping things with the ax, and decides that it is time to go and find the undead monsters. 


His bouts of vampire hunting don't go well, and while out on one nearly fatal hunt, Abe encounters a vampire who actually saves his life. This encounter proves to be a turning point in Abe's life. The vampire helps Abe hone his skills to an even sharper point, and gives him pointers on how, when, and where to kill vampires. Apparently, this good vampire is part of a group of vamps that just want to live among humans, feeding only to stay alive not to kill, and to also stop the more dangerous vampires. Abe accepts this odd partnership and his hunts go definitely better after meeting this vampire. Through the years, Abe kills his fair share of vampires, but soon all the death becomes too much for him. Soon Abe hangs up his ax and marries Mary Todd and starts a family. Also, Abe focuses more on his lawyer business and works towards a career in politics.

Abraham Lincoln, 16th President

Abe's vampire friend comes back after years of absence and draws Abe back into the hunt for vampires. Apparently, the dangerous vampires are in league with the Southern plantation owners, forging a partnership that spells out gruesome fates for the black slaves. Abraham is incensed by this news, and with the help of the good vampires hidden in Congress and the Senate, Abraham is elected president in order to stop the slaughter of thousands of slaves for the pleasure of the vampires. Once Abraham promises to wage war against the evil vampires, tragedy after tragedy befall the Lincoln household: the death of two of their beloved boys. Again, these tragedies are true events, but with deft working of the fictional pen, the tragedies of the Lincoln boys are caused by vampires. 


But this is only the beginning for Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. I won't tell more of the tale, lest I give away too much of the story; and I certainly do not want to give away the end. 


The tale of Abraham Lincoln as a vampire hunter was written in such a way that it felt more like the transcript to a Ken Burns' documentary. As if Ken Burns and Tim Burton got together and this was their literary love child... more on that later... 


The tale of Abe's alternate life is interspersed with selections of Abe's journals. I believe that some are fictional (when they talk of vampires), but yet some may actually be Abraham's words from his real journals. I don't know for sure, but how the language is written these excerpts feel authentic. The emotion that Grahame-Smith works into the words of Abe---true or fictional---is amazing. How Abraham strives to move on, through the revenge of his mother, the deaths of his boys, the murder of friends at the hands of vampires, and yet how he wants to have a normal life and go back to when the world wasn't full of vampires. The internal struggle that Abraham goes through, the growth and epiphanies that he has as we go through the book grabs at your heart and keeps you turning the page. 


I highly recommend this book. If you like history, if you like alternate history, if you like Abraham Lincoln, if you like the Civil War, if you like all of the above or none of the above, you need to read this book. I was pleasantly surprised by this read and found that it left an impression on me that I wouldn't have expected. Not many books leave such a mark on me, and I can count those books on one hand. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter will be a book that stays with you long after you read it. I was actually angry that the book ended, and how it ended. I needed to know the rest of the story. I needed to know what happened after the main events of the book ended. There needs to be a sequel. The events that were alluded to in the last chapter need to be written. Please, Seth Grahame-Smith, this is a personal plea: There needs to be a sequel to this book! 

Movie Poster.... SWEET!

You also need to read this book because coming to a theater near you: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, the movie. From the master that brought us the original Batman movie series, Tim Burton, and the man who brought us the mind- and optical-bending experience of Wanted and 9, director Timur Bekmamtemov; this cinematic duo bring this amazing novel to life. 


Once June 22, 2012 hits, you'll know what I'll be doing that day. 


On my scale of 1 (literary hari kari) to 10 (literary orgasmic bliss), I give Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter a good solid 9. Maybe even a 9.5 just because I love the Civil War and how this reminds me of Ken Burns' Civil War documentary. So yeah. Go get this book and read it. 


What better way to spend your President's Day weekend than reading this epic tale?