"Beastly and Bloody" a tale from the anthology VAMPIRES VS. WEREWOLVES, Age of Adventure
Written by Tommy Hancock
This story is a bit of an oddity, in that it mixes ancient mythology with a classic clash between a vampire and a werewolf. The twist, you see, is that the combatants have a relationship that dates back centuries and is one that almost all fans of literature are familiar with. I won't give too much away here but I will say that I found the story quite engaging, with some wonderfully brutal action. This lives up to the title in more ways than one. It's also the perfect springboard for more adventures starring these characters: in fact, upon finishing it, I assumed that this was the beginning of a series and said as much to the author, who assured me that he was indeed planning to continue the tale.
The author is able to effectively create well-rounded characters with an economy of prose. This is not a story that takes the modern approach of spending pages of self-pitying prose on the main characters, where they bemoan their fates. Here, the characters are conflicted because of their relationship but this is pure pulp goodness: this story MOVES. I quite liked it.
4 out of 5 stars!
