Sookie enjoys a quiet life in a small Southern town, minding her own business and trying to keep others’ thoughts out of her head. As a telepath, the only mental rest she gets is from her boyfriend the vampire.
Summary
Sookie finds living in rural Louisiana soothing. No traffic, no hustle and bustle, and she isn’t overwhelmed by people’s thoughts all that often. Sookie Stackhouse is a telepath, mostly able to screen out the thoughts of people she is near. But working as a server at Merlotte’s Bar and Grill in the tiny town of Bon Temps, she sometimes overhears things about her tight Merlotte’s t-shirt and shorts that she wishes she could erase from her memory.
She’s working a shift one night when a darkly handsome stranger comes in. Right away, she knows he’s different. She can’t hear his thoughts. It turns out he’s a vampire, but she is barely taken aback (having known that vampires exist in big cities after all, but now Bon Temps had one of their own!)
Sookie and Bill the Vampire are drawn to one another, and when women associated with vampires start dying, they team up to track down the killer.
Significance: Dead Until Dark brought vampires into daily life in rural America. It made them maybe okay to date. It was also a breakout smash for the author. According to Kirkus Reviews, Dead Until Dark was the bridge between Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire (1976) and Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight (2005.) That is incredible.
Evaluation
When I first read this book, it took me awhile to warm up to Sookie. She was unlike any character I’d read before: sassy, rural Southern, practical, and blunt. And her name was “Sookie.” But once Vampire Bill arrived on the scene, and shortly thereafter Vampire Eric, things got much more tolerable.
Dead Until Dark – like all the books in the Southern Vampire Mysteries series – was such a fun read. Charlaine Harris crafted characters so enthralling (pun intended) that I began to see those books EVERYWHERE. Being read by everyone, all genders and ages and variable orientations, on public transit, at bus stops, restaurants, planes, Starbucks, you name it. Everyone loved them. And then the HBO series came out and a whole new generation of fans picked up the books.
Why I read it: I read this book over a decade ago, well before the popular HBO series was released. I picked it up again to take another peek because I remembered rolling my eyes at the first book, but by #2 being completely addicted.
Rating: ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ / ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ (rating scale here)
Discussion questions
1) Why does Sookie hate her ability? Or does she?
2) Sookie is pretty Christian – how does she rationalize dating a vampire?
3) If you were a telepath, what might you do with the ability?
4) OK, if you saw the show or finished the series… Team Bill, Eric or Sam?
Genre: Genreblend: Mystery / Supernatural / Vampires / Romance
Awards
- Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original (2002)
- Dilys Award Nominee (2002)
- Agatha Award Nominee for Best Novel (2001)
Readalikes: Royal Street (Suzanne Johnson,) Dark Currents and Autumn Bones (Agent of Hel #1 and #2) (Jacqueline Carey)
Author readalikes: Laurell K. Hamilton, Kimberly Raye
Bibliographic information
Title: Dead Until Dark (Southern Vampire Mystery #1)
Author: Charlaine Harris (http://charlaineharris.com/)
Publication: Ace, New York, 2001
260 pages
ISBN: 9780441008537
Available in: Paperback ($5.99,) Kindle eBook ($7.99.)
Also available for free at your local library.
4into8 
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[…] I read it: I’m always drawn to stories set in Louisiana (vampire or other) and about relationships between women. I’d heard of this book years ago, but had […]
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