When 23-year-old Vladimir Radu posted a video on social media outing himself as a gay vampire he didn’t know what to expect. 

Initially, he just wanted to tell his story and leave it at that. The video was simply a quick hello to the planet, he explained. “I didn’t do it to expose other vampires. I did it to expose myself. All I wanted was to be me, and I couldn’t do that living in the shadows.”

But you can’t go around saying you’re a vampire—a gay vampire!—and not expect some kind of unwanted attention. For example, days after his video went viral, Vlad became a celebrity to a clutch of vampire cosplayers who followed him around in their capes, frilly shirts and ugly polyester corsets. 

More dire, however, Vlad found himself in the crosshairs of Master Sven, the most notorious occultist in human history. Even to vampires, Sven was a nasty dude. He was in league with a host of hoary demons and was the champion of resurrecting long-forgotten forms of magic. He even created the modern-day porn industry, so you know he was a bad mammy jammy.

Sven’s nefarious plan (I think) was to assimilate vampires into mainstream society and create a master race of monsters. But Vlad, with his confessional video, ruined all of that.

Vlad openly rejected his family’s undead legacy. He represented a new generation of non-binary vampires who didn’t want to drink human blood. With his new-found infamy, he had unwittingly become an avatar for change. 

Like Coming Out of the Closet, the previous novel by author D.A. Holmes (read my review here), Bottoms and Bloodsuckers was a breezy LGBTQIA+ coming-of-age story that fiddled around with horror tropes for laughs. 

Without a doubt Holmes’s book was funny, but he didn’t shy away from shocking the reader when the opportunity presented itself. The late-night fight at Denny’s pitting Vlad and his friends against a gang of occultists was ghastly. And visits to stately Radu manor were also quite spine-tingling. The image of Maria Radu sensually feasting on a corpse haunts me still. 

All of the carnage at Denny’s was mainly due to Vlad’s new servant and companion (i.e. familiar). Charlie Rockwell was a shaggy-haired, stoner popinjay who was tasked with protecting Vlad from harm. He was a lovable sidekick with an overly enthusiastic Jack the Ripper streak. Vlad wanted no part in vampire traditions, but he quickly realized that a familiar like Charlie could be useful in certain situations. 

Other significant characters are introduced in Bottoms and Bloodsuckers—in particular Daniel Mai and Jenny, a waitress working the nightshift at Denny’s. And, of course, everybody’s favorite goth girl Alison Grady returns to help her friend “Count Popular” navigate the tangled line between monster and man cub.  

[ Bottoms and Bloodsuckers / By D.A. Holmes / First Printing: May 2024 / ISBN: 9798322523369 ]