REVIEW: Empire of The Vampire by Jay Kristoff

Empire of the Vampire is the first novel in its series by Jay Kristoff. Jay Kristoff is known for turning the world on its head so it’s no surprise that this book is set in a world where the sun hasn’t risen for 27 years. Apart from the obvious title, this setting lays fantastic groundwork for a vampire tale.

Our story begins as human territories are being fought over by different vampire factions, Gabriel De Leon of the famous Silversaints, is the last of his kind. Silversaints are a brotherhood of warriors sworn to protect the church against the evils of the world but when the sun went, the vampires took over it unfortunately they were no match and some of the silver saints died. We now follow him retelling the tales of his life to a vampire that has captured him. The Vampire known as Jean Francois is a vampire historian, and as the last silversaint left, Gabriel is known as legend.

Wanting to know more about Gabriel, Francois makes him recount the many exciting tales of his life, including Killing the forever king before they actually kill Gabriel for his crimes. Gabriel first talks about his teenage years and growing up, his many relationships and what eventually led him to the silversaints. He then goes on to talk about how he became an addict and why he has become such a legend and how he must be one of the most wanted people on the planet. But despite being an absolute arsehole and dick he is eventually led to believe that he might be humanity’s last hope to restore what it once was. And that leads us to the now, being captured and recounting his life to eventually be led to his execution.

Having heard that this book was being written by Jay Kristoff, I was delighted as I have previously loved the Nevernight series by him. Jay Kristoff writing vampires will make them again something of horror and fantasy rather than the vampires that we have known in the last 20 years or so. It was a long book but thoroughly thought out and well enjoyed by me. I will say though that I do not get on very well with mixed POVs and timelines but I actually sort of understood this one.

4 out of 5 stars.