Dead Boyfriend is my guilty pleasure: an engaging narrator and fun sex scenes—what’s not to like.  The whole vampire thing is trod rather lightly, and though the writing is a bit uneven, when it’s fun, it’s a lot of fun.

Regan St. James is a self-possesed, horny teenaged vampire hunter, in town to take his high school equivalency exams.  First night, while out looking to scratch a certain itch, he happens across Ira in a bar near the local college.  They flirt a bit, then Regan leads them outside for the privacy of the alleyway, where several minutes of that fun sex I mentioned ensues.  It’s not until the next day, when he bumps into Ira again, that Regan realises Ira’s a vampire.  Still, it was a hot date (or cool, depending on the way you look at it), and after some more flirting, the two of them decide on a real date.  Too bad Ira’s ex-girlfriend doesn’t like him dating, and has the superhuman strength to back up the threat.

Dead Boyfriend is at its best when Regan is flirting or snarking—he’s smart and has a quick tongue (hey! get your mind out of the gutter! . . . okay, yes, that way, too) and when he’s using it, the story is a lot of fun.  The fight scenes aren’t bad, either.  But at other times, the story can bog down in long passages of overly-descriptive narrative, with the tone often dipping into self-satisfied arrogance.  I suppose it is a believable part of Regan’s personality, but the contrast is stark, and the writing loses its spark in these passages. 

For me, Dead Boyfriend is a fun diversion.  At the moment, the story seems on a knife’s-edge: if it heads into more of the long narrative stuff, it may lose my interest; but if it keeps to the lighter tone, I think I’ll be enjoying it for a good time to come.  If you enjoy stories with gay characters, and don’t mind explicit sex, do yourself a favour and check it out.

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I recommend "Dead Boyfriend" because the writing is exceptional, the plot is fascinating, and the characters are awesome. 

In fact, I consider the main characters almost too awesome, so hopefully most of you can still enjoy characters who aren’t "too real for comfort," so to speak.  I think the main characters [more . . .]

I considered giving Dead Boyfriend 4 out of 5 stars because, though I love-love-loved it, the English Literature major in me continues to point out that it’s not exactly Shakespeare. But you know what, I read the first 42 parts of this story last night sitting on my couch while watching a BBC production of Hamlet. Guess which one [more . . .]

I decided to give Dead Boyfriend a try based on a chapter the author wrote for another serial web story: Tales of MU. Writing someone else’s characters is never easy, but this author had a light, deft touch that left me delighted with the short, clever story he’d written for ToMU.

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