This book is a persistence predator, with steady, deceptively slow pacing always climbing toward revelation, and the tension is exquisite, especially the ever-ratcheting tension of our opera excursion in “A Musical Interlude” brings things to a head.

Some books permanently alter how you think, and I strongly suspect Charnas’s The Vampire Tapestry will be one of these for me. I could see where it had influenced the vampire novels I grew up on, creating the monsters I loved. It’s great to see Charnas’s influence emerge again, like Weyland himself, unrelenting despite the march of time yet eternally tangled in the past. I can’t wait to see what new monsters are spawned from this reprint.

Originally published in 1980, Tor Essentials' re-release of Suzy McKee Charnas' The Vampire Tapestry well crafted vampire tale inspires us to consider what truly makes one human.

At the center of the story is the cold, but highly intelligent and driven anthropology professor Dr. Edward Lewis Weyland. Through four sections, and one musical or theatrical interlude, we see Dr. Weyland through the perspective of others, before concluding with his own summation of the novel's events and what might be next.

It is a journey through humanity in all our glory and foibles. Weyland is at first smug and conceited, and promptly suffers for his assumptions, at least as seen through others. There are occultists, academics, support staff, those out to make a quick buck, lonely people, psychoanalysts or those perceptive enough to see past masks.

Recommended to readers or vampire stories, well-crafted fiction or stories of the limits of humanity.

This is my first read from Nebula Award winner Suzy McKee Charnas. I did not enjoy this anthology book comprised of five novellas.
The stories within this anthology are regrettably slow paced. We follow vampire Dr. Weyland, a university professor who preys off of students. Charnas does not cover any new territory in the vampire genre, and there is not a lot of plot or tension within the novellas to engage the reader. Unfortunately this did not hit the mark for me.
Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for providing an advanced copy of this book for review.

Dr. Lewis Wayland is not your typical sun fearing, sparkly vampire. A respected academic, his condition is biological as opposed to supernatural, and in The Vampire Tapestry we get to see him in five different scenarios that real as much of himself as the world we live in.

A creative vampire story that’s a bindup of 5 novellas, one of which I think was nominated for the Nebula. These novellas range anywhere from problematic to fascinating, featuring different facets of the main character in different situations, and it’s one of those books where everyone’s mileage is going to vary wildly. From psychological exploration to operatic appreciation, the novellas cover a range of fascinating topics as backdrops and tools to examine Wayland the vampire. They do contain some obvious biases that wouldn’t fly in 2025 where it comes to race, but are much more in line with modern thought when topics like gender and sexuality come up.

First we have The Ancient Mind at Work, in which we get introduced to Wayland and the main secondary character of this story, Katje de Groot. Wayland comes across as an unpersonable academic, but Katje’s the most difficult part of the novella, and her POV is so problematic that I don’t blame anyone for DNFing this book solely based on her. Firstly, she’s a white South African woman who migrated to the US, and she’s very much a product of Apartheid in the thoughts she has regarding one of the minority cast members. Her fond memories of her life in SA reek of privilege and exploitation and she only just barely remembers it, but worst of all is the absolutely stupid way she discovers that Wayland is a vampire, which I don’t consider a spoiler because it happens literally on the first page - she simply looks at him and knows. And is confident in her completely preposterous guess to violently act on it. The woman is literally a Karen. Aside from all of that, this novella really just serves to introduce us to Wayland, reveal what makes him different from the vampires you’ve experienced in media to date in the most arbitrary and tiresome way possible, and to serve as the triggering event for the following series of novellas. It’s the worst of the lot by a decent measure, not a great way to start the book but if you make it past it, you’re probably in for an interesting time.

Next we have The Land of Lost Content. In this one, Wayland has been captured and imprisoned in a weakened state by a shady character who reveals him to a Satanic cult. Given that setup, surprisingly the big focus of this novella feels almost like innocence - in Wayland’s abuse and exploitation we see a largely innocent character subjected to some of the worst of humanity simply for profit, and it’s underscored by the bond he forms with the teenage nephew of his captor, an unwilling accomplice with whom he begins to form a bond of sorts. It ends in the way you might guess but it also sets the stage for what comes next.

Unicorn Tapestry is the Nebula and Locus nominated novella in the collection, with good reason; it’s easily the best of the lot, and why the book peaks at the midpoint. In an attempt to get back into a variation of his former life Wayland willingly enters therapy, and through the interaction with Dr. Landaeur, a psychologist struggling with the challenges of her own life, the pair find themselves in a deeply explorative relationship about the nature of Wayland’s psyche, the way he integrates into society and his relationship with humanity. It’s brilliantly done, an extremely fascinating read and for me the saving grace of the entire book.

Next we have A Musical Interlude, in which Wayland in his new environment goes to watch the opera. Wayland is surly and standoffish, and despite his previous assertions of the way he views humanity’s art, in this outing we see him deeply moved by the opera, Wayland at his most violent, animalistic which matches the lead character of the opera’s personality. The lead opera character is almost a mirror for Wayland, in the way he presents as aristocratic but behaves much baser, and is described as someone who is typically played in a much animalistic fashion. This section was okay, I think if you’re an opera person you might like it more.

Finally, we have The Last of Dr. Wayland, in which we explore the method by which Dr. Wayland is able to survive for centuries, and it focuses on the transitory nature of humanity, from our short life spans, death, and the culture and history of our societies. It also neatly wraps up all the plot threads to date, gives us a hint a just how some of the characters have changed since they first met Weyland, and most importantly we see how drastically he’s changed, and just what he thinks this means for him as an apex predator.

All in all, an interesting book that takes a serious crack at a what if scenario for real vampires, and dissecting what that could potentially mean for them and for humanity on multiple levels. A very interesting read.

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Tor Essentials is a series of books created in the last few years aiming to bring to genre titles which have stood the test of time back into vogue for a new generation of readers. Recent additions to their range include China Mieville, Nisi Shawl, Debra Doyle, James D MacDonald, Jo Walton, Vernor Vinge, Terri Windling, John Brunner, Gene Wolf, John Scalzi, Steve Brust and now Suzy McKee Charnas. Each volume is introduced by an appropriate literary figure, with The Vampire Tapestry being presented by Nicola Griffith, best known for Spear.

Charnas, who passed away in 2023, wrote a wide range of science fiction, fantasy, short stories, for children, non-fiction and won top genre awards including the 1980 Nebula Award for The Unicorn Tapestry. The Vampire Tapestry, originally published in 1980, was one of her best known novels which Guillermo del Toro called a “masterpiece” and she also repackaged as a stage play.

Guillermo and I will have to disagree on the status of The Vampire Tapestry, which I found to be a sluggish, droll and uninvolving which was a struggle to finish. The main character is Dr Edward Weyland, who is a vampire and is presented as almost human. He works in a university as an Anthropology lecturer and runs sleep studies, where he steals the blood of students for food. He can walk about in daylight and does not bite his victims, instead uses a mechanism in his tongue to withdraw blood. There is nothing wrong with playing around with the ‘rules’ surrounding vampires with the book relying upon his humanity more than him being a monster, but the result is the most boring vampire in existence. If you are interested in social commentary then this might hit the spot, otherwise it is totally devoid of action and if you are after a more traditional action novel then look elsewhere.

The Vampire Tapestry is presented in five parts, supposedly interconnected but standalone novellas, which centre around the vampire in different ways. This just did not work, as being about a vampire was not enough for a central plot. Weyland was not a hero, an anti-hero or a villain, with other characters drifting in and out of the story. For example, the main character in the first section is a South African immigrant who knows Weyland is a vampire, but after the first part she disappears. Other characters do have repeat appearances, but Weyland (who was apparently very attractive to women) does not have the charisma, he is much too detached and aloof, to carry the story.

Weyland shows empathy for his victims but that is not enough to carry the story and, who knows, perhaps Josh Whedon came across him in dreaming up Buffy’s squeeze Angel! I have never come across Suzy McKee Charnas or this book before and so am unsure of its ‘status’ in the pantheon of great vampire novels, many of which were published around the same time as this. Perhaps there is a reason it does not appear alongside Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot (1975), Anne Rice’s Interview With the Vampire (1976) or Robert McCammon’s They Thirst (1981). The reason is simple: it just is not good enough.

Tor’s blurb also notes that their Essential range is for books which have stood the test of time. I would question whether The Vampire Tapestry has done so. In the very first section there is a woman from Apartheid-era South Africa who questions whether she is able to converse with Black people normally, with a world view where hunting rhinos is acceptable. In the same section it is implied that those women who are raped around the college campus have only themselves to blame as they are out late on their own. Even bearing in mind this book was published in 1980; I’m not sure such opinions will sit well with modern audiences of today.

Considering the book is about the vampire he has a surprisingly small part in the first story, which concerns a women who works on the university campus who knows what he is and watches from a distance. The second part moves to a different set of characters after Weyland leaves the campus and ends up trapped with a group who realise he is a vampire.

The third novella sees Weyland in therapy, giving the author to provide the vampire’s worldly view, whilst the therapist rightly thinks he is totally deluded. The fourth part was probably the most boring with the reader basically watching the opera Tosca through the eyes of the vampire once he has a new job in a different part of America. The final part had its moments, with a cult arising around the vampire and his musings around humans not being just cattle.

I am unsure of the point of rereleasing The Vampire Tapestry as it failed to grip, was disjointed and had an incredibly unlikable central character. Some books age better than others and this one should have been left in the eighties.