The story begins in the aftermath of Memnoch the Devil. Vampires from all over the globe have gathered around Lestat, who lies prostrate on the floor of a cathedral. Dead? In a coma? As Armand reflects on Lestat's condition, he is drawn by David Talbot to tell the story of his own life. The narrative abruptly rushes back to 15th-century Constantinople, and the Armand of the present recounts the fragmented memories of his childhood abduction from Kiev. Eventually, he is sold to a Venetian artist (and vampire), Marius. Rice revels in descriptions of the sensual relationship between the young and still-mortal Armand and his vampiric mentor. But when Armand is finally transformed, the tone of the book dramatically shifts. Raw and sexually explicit scenes are displaced by Armand's introspective quest for a union of his Russian Orthodox childhood, his hedonistic life with Marius, and his newly acquired immortality.
It seems that with ever vampire novel, the stories get more weird, at least in my opinion. It seems lately that Anne Rice has been writing novels just for the sake of getting a book out there, for money purposes only. Shouldn't it be about the story and not the money? Especially for a successful writer like Anne Rice.
With this novel, we hear about how Armand was created as a vampire. Most of this story wasn't even about him as a vampire! All they talked about was Armand's life before his becoming a vampire, while he worked as a servant in this dark and mysterious lord's villa in Italy. Surprise, surprise, the man is actually a vampire and not really a man. This story was so forgettable that I forget the man's name, and it hasn't been that long since I read the book.
I don't know what more I can say about this book, either you like it or you don't. I know one thing, I stopped reading this book well before the ending, I just couldn't take it anymore.