Suck It Up

Suck It Up
by Brian Meehl
YA fiction. 321 pp.
Delacorte. 2008.

flap copy:

Dear Reader,

Are you up to your neck in bloodsucking vampire stories?

Tired of those tales about dentally enhanced dark lords?

Before I wrote this book, I thought all vampires were night-stalking, fang-popping, bloodsucking fiends.

Then I met Morning McCobb. He drinks a soy-based blood substitute called Blood Lite. He believes staking should be classified as a hate crime. And someday he hopes to march in a Vampire Pride Parade. He was also the first vampire to out himself and tries to show people of mortality, like you and me, that vampires are just another minority with special needs. Trust me—this is like on other vampire book you'll ever feed on.

So, as my buddy Morning says, "Pop the lid and suck it up."

Portia Dredful
(aka the author)

The undead get a madcap makeover in Brian Meehl's funny-bone-chilling tale, as creatures of the night shape-shift into creatures of the twenty-first century.

I read this book at the behest of Fobby, and I'm glad I did.

It's part vampire novel/part superhero novel/part gay metaphor novel. But it's fully enjoyable. The author has done a grand job of creating a character—Morning McCobb—who is so fully likable. And that's nice for a change. I like the snippets of the IVLeague.us website that have been included. (Though I was greatly disappointed to find out that when you log on to that website, it is not the IVLeague website but is merely a redirectional link to the author's website.)

My one gripe with this book is PoV shifting. Nossa. The author has a tendency to switch point of view without warning, and I find that so irritating. Especially when it comes without warning or you only realize it at the second or third sentence into the new PoV.

Despite that, I still recommend this book. It's definitely far better than the quasi-porn travesty people picked up to read this weekend.