Unfortunately this just wasn't my book.
It was too slow for my liking. The idea and premise of this was cool but sadly I had to through in the towel.

I have been a fan of Graham Jones since "The Only Good Indians" and have read most of his work. This is by far his best work so far. For me his books start out at as a slow burn but I knew the shoe would drop and when it did, I was on edge for a lot of the book. This is such an interesting take on vampires and other such supernatural things, like Deer Woman from only good Indians. The body horror in this was amazing in all the right ways. It was creepy, got me on edge but it was the story that kept me. Good Stabs weekly visits and talks with Arthur made me excited to flesh out this mystery on why he was there to begin with, what was he and where did Etsy fit in on all of this. I know people have said that the ending to good Indians was rushed and let them wanting more but I feel with this he really made up to people who thought that. The story read like a movie I could picture everything and I do hope we get something of his on screen. Stephen is truly up there with the greats like King, Paul Trembly, Grady Hendrix and all the other up and coming horror people. I think we will look back and see that he is truly in the top 3 greatest horror authors

Sometimes the hardest horror to read is the horror that has truth behind it. This is one of those.

Lyrical historical horror, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is a vampire story like no other. It may be hard to follow at times, with Native American language sometimes being difficult to decipher, but the fundamental story hits hard because parts of it really happened.

I saw a review in advance that recommended reading up on the Pikuni/Piegan Blackfeet tribe and the Marias Massacre…I owe that person a debt. You’ll be able to follow and enjoy the story without doing any research first, but if you do read up on the true events of the story, you will understand the nuances so much more.
This is slow burn horror for sure, the kind that creeps under your skin until you find yourself engrossed in the last 40% when the plot really picks up. My heart broke more than once.

Part historical horror, epistolary horror and historical horror, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is haunting, lyrical and sophisticated. You will be uncomfortable reading this, and you should be uncomfortable.

"What I am is the Indian who can't die. I'm the worst dream America ever had."

This book is a brutal scream of rage. It's dark and difficult to read, but I'm so glad I read it. A blood-drinking Blackfoot Indian who can't die (the word "vampire" is never used, but this is, as an elevator pitch, a Native American vampire story) tells his story to a gluttonous pastor in 1912, Interview with the Vampire style. As the story unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear how the pastor and the vampire's paths intertwine. All of this is bookended by a white researcher in modern times reading her great-grandfather's story as fodder for academic research.

The violence is visceral, both the violence of vampiric nature, and the violence of white settlers stealing land and erasing buffalos and Native Americans with unquestioned entitlement. I never could have guessed the ending, which is wonderfully weird and unexpectedly triumphant. I'm going to be thinking about this book for a long time - it definitely cements Graham Jones as one of the best horror writers around.

The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones (Titan Books)was kindly provided by Netgalley. It will be released on 18th March 2025.

This is the story of Etsy Beaucarne; only it's not. Instead, it's the story of a Luthern Pastor whose past refuses to stay buried. Told through a series of diary posts the truth of what happened in the past returns to haunt the present.

Ostensibly, this is a vampire novel, a story of revenge that is set in the last days of the "Wild West" and the confessions of men who have terrible things.

Full of visceral violence, this is not a book for the squeamish, but features a unique voice within the world of Horror, the voice of Native Americans that brings their folklore and traditions to modern audiences.

Ultimately, while I didn't love The Only Good Indians, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter was easily a five-star read.

#TheBuffaloHunterHunter #NetGalley

I’ve seen other readers DNF because it’s too slow or not vampiric enough, what did they expect Twilight or Jack Reacher? It does build slowly and that enhances the dread and horror, as for vampires I think folks need to understand that Dracula isn’t canon 😉

A grotesque horror of Blackfeet resistance and revenge.

This is a deeply personal vampire horror where Stephen Graham Jones confidently blends European vampire myths with his own heritage, stamping familiar vampiric tropes with something new, adding a refreshingly original twist to the burgeoning sub-genre. I think a sign of a fantastic book is when it teaches you something, and this novel had me frequently reaching for my phone to research more into the locations, traditions and peoples that Stephen Graham Jones writes into his story. Being Aussie, my knowledge of anything other than broad American frontier histories is passing at best, and I learnt plenty from this book. But the true power of the book is in the simmering anger that fills the words: anger at dispossession, at imperialism and at genocide. With Good Stab, Jones gives his people a dark power to fight against the inexorable imperialist machine.

Jones builds upon elements you’d expect to see in a vampire or Gothic novel, acknowledging (explicitly at one point) its Dracula roots. First, an epistolatory structure, expanded here to three nested narratives, although I thought Etsy’s framing narrative could have been interwoven more frequently, which would serve to improve the ending by keeping her more relevant. Then, another vampire staple as stories are revealed through ‘interviews’ – confession in this case – as the vampire relates his sorry tale. Christianity is prevalent, as the darkness of faith consumes Arthur Beaucarne: if he believes in his God, then so too must he believe in the monsters in opposition. Lastly, the book explores outsiders, those in isolation, apart from their societies, living on the fringes where terror lurks in every shadow.

This is a bloody, violent book, filled with utterly visceral moments which are not for the faint-hearted. This is splatter horror at times, with a dark fascination with the near immortality of its vampire subjects, whose ‘abilities’ of blood-drinking, transformation and otherworldly strength and speed are constructed brilliantly and are utterly believable and terrifying in Jones’ world. The landscapes of the Great Plains and the Backbone Mountains are described excellently, capturing Blackfeet traditions and connections. You get a real sense of the power and significance of the natural spaces. This is a book you’d term ‘Great Plains Gothic’ and Jones does well to confront the dark deeds of imperial conquest with a vampiric darkness of his own.

A really interesting read. I just wish the modern-day framing story was better.

I was so excited to have been approved for an early copy of this, so naturally I picked this up the day I got it.
It's been 20 days and I just can't do it anymore. I am DNFing at 38%. First things first, it should never take me 20 days to read a book. But it's really hard to finish something when it puts me to sleep every handful of pages. It got to the point where I'd wait until the evenings to pick this up because I knew I'd be asleep soon. I couldn't get into the writing, there was nothing gripping there at all. Which is such a shame, because I know what this author can evoke. Have you read his acknowledgements??!! I could feel the words leaving my brain as soon as I'd read them, which also meant I had no attachment to these characters or the plot. This is supposed to be a vampire novel, but the vampire elements are lacking at best. I obviously can't say if those elements become more developed and present the further you get in to the story, but I've spent so much of my time here as it is that I truly cannot be bothered to find out. I know this book will find its audience, SGJ does not need my help there, but geez I wish this could've been a hit for me. Better luck next time, I suppose. 🤞

I had to DNF at around 20%. While the premise was intriguing, the pacing felt too slow for my tastes. That said, it features some of the best writing I’ve encountered in a Stephen Graham Jones novel.

I received an advance reader copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for my honest review.

He's done it again. Stephen Graham Jones has written a masterpiece. This story marries Native American legend with the vampire.

Etsy Beaucarne, a single college professor, is presented with a journal written by her great-great-grandfather. The entries tell a fantastic story of his checkered past, and his visits with a Blackfeet Indian named Good Stab.

This book is dark, fascinating, and heartbreaking. Read at your own risk.

The Buffalo Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones is an electrifying blend of historical fiction, horror, and cultural reckoning. Set against the haunting backdrop of the American West in 1912, this novel immerses readers in a chilling narrative that is as unsettling as it is profound. Jones masterfully intertwines the supernatural with the historical, creating a story that feels otherworldly and deeply grounded in real-life injustices.

The diary format, chronicling the Lutheran pastor’s transcriptions of Good Stab’s confessions, is ingenious, lending an air of authenticity to the tale. Good Stab is a fascinating character—his search for justice is deeply rooted in pain and resilience, making him terrifying and sympathetic. The threads of revenge and redemption are woven with such precision that every page is charged with tension and emotion.

Jones’s prose is vivid and atmospheric, painting a stark picture of the snowy fields and the horrors that lurk within them. The 217 Blackfeet dead serve as a haunting backdrop, grounding the story in historical tragedy and amplifying the stakes of the supernatural elements. The vampire’s role as a monster and an agent of justice is a brilliant twist that challenges traditional horror tropes.

This is not just a horror novel—it’s a powerful commentary on history, revenge, and the enduring scars of colonization. Stephen Graham Jones proves once again why he’s a master of the genre. The Buffalo Hunter is a must-read for literary horror and historical fiction fans alike. A chilling, unforgettable tale

Such a good and unique take on a "vampire story." But also so much more than that. Not really sure what to say about this book that doesn't give away the best parts. I struggled a little bit at the beginning of the book with the Blackfeet names for different places/animals, but once I got the hang of those terms/phrases it wasn't an issue. This book was a "slow burn" type of read in all of the good ways to interpret that phrase. It was sunk its' fangs into me and never let go until the end. At times it was sad, scary, gruesome and "peek through your fingers" tense, but always engaging and interesting. The bottom line is Stephen Graham Jones is one of those authors that no matter what he writes next, I will definitely be reading it.

This book was brutal, raw, and haunting in the best way imaginable. Anytime I picked this book up I was immediately back into the story. I am so obsessed with the way the character are developed in this novel.

Novel contains - LOTS of animal death - I understand why as it's crucial to the story line - Just a warning !

Thank you to the Publishers!!!

I can not wait to get my own physical copy.

The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones had a slow start and felt disjointed due to its multiple POVs. Despite its good writing and intriguing synopsis, it just wasn’t my genre. However, if you’re interested in this type of story, it might be worth reading.

This one is really well done, told mostly by a discovered journal from over a hundred years ago. Largely historical horror but of course with some gory violence as well and a lot of indigenous myth and history tied in. Also the author has some interesting takes on how it works to be this kind of mythological monster, some of which I've never seen before.

Stephen Graham Jones weaves historical horrors with classic monster tropes into a spellbinding narrative of the “Wild West”.

“The depravity of man’s heart knows no floor, and everyone in this hard country has a sordid chapter in the story of their life, that they’re trying either to atone for, or stay ahead of. It’s what binds us one to the other.”

When a hundred year old journal is discovered in the walls of a building, Etsy Beaucarne is shocked to learn it’s an accounting of her ancestor’s life and sudden disappearance.

Arthur Beaucarne is a Pastor in the newly appointed state of Montana. With a secret past, he hopes to have redeemed his soul by preaching to others. In his old age, his life is routine now until a mysterious Blackfoot man begins showing up to his services…

“Either way, the time for scalping is well behind us,” I said. “This is a new day, is it not?” I lifted my arms, enveloping the whole grand chapel, and the civilized town beyond it.
“Or it’s a single, long night,” he said…”

The man known as The Fullblood begins telling an unholy tale of vampiric creatures, recollecting the horrors of white men killing the buffalo and the indigenous people. He’s there to confess his sins and possibly seek vengeance against those who have wronged his people.

These tales within tales all connect in a tapestry of bloody colonization. This tome is weighty, but well worth the time it takes to read it. Even though this is fiction, it’s so important to get perspective on some of the true events that occurred from indigenous characters written by an indigenous author. My eyes were open to events and places I had really never heard of before- and I’ll continue the journey by trying to find more nonfiction details.

“All we have left here is rot and decay.”

SGJ writes in vivid, atmospheric detail; this had me awestruck at some moments, and heartsick at others. I especially loved Good Stab’s sections, how the indigenous lore, customs, and language were such important parts of the story and meant so much to this character especially. His conflicted conscience and actions make me sympathize for his plight.
Arthur was very dislikable. He seems like such a hypocritical and hollow man of faith. I never felt he had anyone’s interests at heart except his own. I also found his narrative to be a bit dry and boring. Sometimes I was skimming these sections to get more into the meat of “The Nachzehrer’s Dark Gospel”.
I would’ve like to see more of Etsy at the end of the story- what happens for her next?

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and Titan Books for a copy.

This is a difficult book to read and review in much the same way as The Reformatory was for me; a dark and unsettling story of generational trauma and revenge. Not so much scary as gruesome and creepy, with important but disturbing themes and a time in history that none of us should look away from.

The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is about the liminal space between time periods gone by that can never be again, but not romanticized for the white gaze like Dances With Wolves; and as the author put it in his ackowledgments, vampire stories are really time travel stories. I hadn't read many indigenous vampires before other than Nick Medina, but I was drawn to the idea of a weird Western, an Indian vampire taking his bloodthirsty revenge over the generations. There were some nods to Dances With Wolves though, like the scenes of skinned and massacred buffalo herds.

The story is told in an epistolary, meta/breaking the fourth wall manner, first from the point of view of Etsy, a communications professor who unearths the journal of her ancestor, a Lutheran pastor, a troubled alcoholic who records a series of strange confessions from a mysterious Indian with an aversion to light. Then the narrative jumps to that of the Indian recounting his story of how he came to be a monster. He is turned during the last time Indians lived out their culture before it was subsumed by colonialism, in the 1870s, and he is wracked by grief over civilization as he knew it dying, stolen by the white man and modernity. But it soon becomes apparent that it is not the vampire who needs absolution, as a series of grisly murders unfold in the remote outpost. White men are stripped of their skin in much the same way that buffalo hunters ripped the hides and tongues of their kills.

I found the identity of the murderer fairly obvious but this was not so much a murder mystery; that was just a backdrop for the true confession of generational trauma and revenge, and the real crux of the book - how can one man and his descendents ever make amends for the horrors committed against a people whose land they stole?

I thought the story was difficult to read not just because of the subject matter but because the first-person accounts of both Arthur, the pastor, and Good Stab, the vampire, were written in old-fashioned diction and not modern language. I wished I'd had a glossary for the Blackfeet names for things and places because I found them hard to figure out through context clues, for example still do not know what a swift-runner is.

It was an interesting take on vampires, not the sparkly, wealthy, good-looking vampires of Twilight but the monstrous creatures of Nosferatu and Dracula, who take on the traits of the creatures whose blood they suck. There were some stereotypical vampire traits but I was confused about how vampires were turned and they were too impossible to kill. Overall I found it an original take on vampires and I found it interesting how the Indians in the story related to the vampires in their midst.

However, this is trademark Stephen Graham Jones and a worthy stand-alone successor to the Indian Lake trilogy. Etsy had a lot of Jade in her still. If you love this author's writing you will love this heavy and disturbing tale about an endangered culture's attempt at survival through fang and nail.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the advance review copy. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Stephen Graham Jones is such a unique author. I think this book is at its best when it is focusing on the unsettling atmosphere and dread of the main character's situations. I think the part where I struggled with this book was the overall character choices in general. I wanted to be invested in the story and the character's but found it difficult to do so. It felt like the story could have been a bit more tightened and that could have helped. Overall, interesting read that maybe didn't land with me quite the way I was hoping.

My goodness. Let me say this up front, this starts out slow and moves slow, but hang in there. This book is a masterpiece of storytelling. I love this style of writing so this was perfect for me. Even if you don’t like epistolary, stick with this book. You will not regret it.

This book will stay with me for a long time. The sense of anticipation, and the rich detail and storytelling was just wonderful. It did take me a little while to get into, but once I was in, I was hooked.

The heart break of Good Stab’s story, alongside his suffering and self loathing was tangible. It was an uncomfortable read at times, but one I am glad to have read.

It was a shame that the main tone of the story was jot continued all the way through. Etsy’s writing style was in stark contrast to that of the main writing, which was a bit of a shame. I understand the necessity, but I did find the ending a bit disappointing because of this. However, this is so disappointment following a spectacular story, so it was still great.