Author: Clark Casey
First Published: 2018
Contains spoilers
The blurb: After fending off an attack by the werewolf pack, the saloon is in shambles and half of the dead outlaws have been sent to Hell. Nigel, the lone vampire, takes up the job of sheriff in order to protect the only living boy in Damnation.
A second vampire, with whom Nigel has some history and still bears a grudge, comes to town. To make matters worse, an army of angry Indian warriors arrive, and they're not too keen on sharing their spirit world with the soldiers who killed them.
A sudden scarcity of food and booze spurs the election of a hawkish mayor, who controls the vampires with an unlikely source of warm blood. Buddy and some ragtag gunslingers are left to defend their territory against an entire nation of dead Indians led by an invincible brave.
The review: I definitely enjoyed the first book in Clark Casey’s Damnation series. Whilst ostensibly a Western setting, the books are actually set in a purgatory like setting in a town called Damnation where the souls of the almost damned reside and are split roughly into three factions – settlers, native Americans (both of whom were human, of course) and werewolves. The rules of Damnation are: die again and go to Hell, last twelve months without killing someone and ascend to heaven.
At the end of the last book we discovered that a “warm” baby, Martin, had been born – the mother pregnant when killed somehow kept and carried the baby to term. Nigel, the town’s vampire and sheriff, was strangely not interested in his warm blood and in this we discover that he thinks the baby might actually be his nephew – vampires being a separate species but one that can, on occasion, interbreed with humans. Also, in town is a new, second vampire, called Luther – once an enforcer for the vampire council.
The start of this volume sees the population of Native Americans growing and the balance of power begin to shift – that is until a baby chick is born – another source of warm blood and one that could be used to exploit the vampires. The pace of the book is fast and the book carries a humour born of the excellently realised characters. What Casey also does in this is start to play with the rules, much to the exasperation of the characters, which prevents any level of staleness from creeping in. If I enjoyed book one of the series then I thoroughly enjoyed this volume. Going from strength to strength, I’ll give this volume 8.5 out of 10.
This review was written for Vamped and has been posted here with permission.
In Paperback @ Amazon US
In Paperback @ Amazon UK
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