A 1990 novel by James Herbert.
At the funeral of actress Lily Neverless, paparazzo Joe Creed awaits photo opportunities. On dispersal of the mourners, he sees an elderly man masturbate over the gravesite, which, to Creed’s bewildered disquiet, momentarily writhes, as if disturbed from beneath. He photographs the man, who turns to meet his gaze with a look of frightening penetration.
That night, a press launch draws his eye to Cally McNally, who asks if Creed might garner some publicity for her boss. Woken in the early hours, Creed braves the stairs to his darkroom, where, petrified and perplexed by the intruder’s resemblance to the first onscreen Dracula, a fall downstairs knocks him unconscious.
Investigation reveals the grave defiler to closely resemble Nicholas Mallik, a murderous occultist hanged just before World War II. Following a terrifyingly surreal encounter with his toilet, Creed finds a note demanding delivery of the incriminating photos. Cally entreats his compliance. Attempt to extort an exorbitant fee sees Creed chased home by the Orlok lookalike to find Sammy, his visiting ten-year-old son, suddenly absent...
Not to be confused with the 2015 film.
This novel provides examples of:
- Action Dad: Creed, with his son threatened, is quite willing to walk into danger, even if scared rigid.
- Amicable Exes: Averted with Creed and ex-wife Evelyn, whose vexation with Creed’s antisocial occupation extends to rather extravagant outbursts.
- Big Bad: Mallik, head of demonic cult the Fallen Angels, instigates the overall threat.
- Big Eater: In a nice aversion of Straw Character, Sammy’s appetite is implied to be innate, rather than fanned by parental indulgence.
- Blob Monster: Laura, of the Fallen Angels, briefly morphs into a very
memorable such beastie. - Came Back Wrong: The reanimated corpse of Lily Neverless retains effects of putrefaction, which rather impedes her movements.
- Camera Sniper: Our hero is very good at his job. With considerable audacity, he infiltrates high-profile crowds; the cottage retreat of a burly IRA supporter, and the Mountjoy Retreat, mental asylum base of the Fallen Angels.
- Cats Are Mean: Subverted; Grin, Creed’s live-in stray, is aloof and impudent rather than mean.
- The Cavalry: Creed’s paparazzi colleagues descend upon the Mountjoy Retreat.
- Celebrity Resemblance: Creed, to a young Mickey Rouerke.
- Eldritch Location: Creed opens a door to find Mallik standing in a black void.
- Evil Sounds Raspy: Mallik’s voice is wearily hoarse.
- Genre Blind: An already nervous Creed thinks he can extort from Mallik an exorbitant fee in return for incriminating photos.
- Good Girl Gone Bad: Inverted with Cally, who grew weary of evilness.
- Handsome Lech: Creed’s forward advances are sometimes reciprocated.
- Intrepid Reporter: Prunella, a colleague who takes a shine to Creed, uncovers the location of villainous headquarters the Mountjoy Retreat.
- Jekyll & Hyde: Laura, another side of Cally’s persona, born of base lust for Creed.
- Jerkass: Gossip columnist Anthony Blythe, a snide, bullying misanthrope.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While his cynicism extends to photographing an elderly inmate of the squalid recesses of the Mountjoy Retreat, Creed doesn’t mean any real harm, and cares for his son.
- Lemony Narrator: Herbert has some fun with this.
- Nightmare Face: On arrival of the paparazzi, Mallik’s face is “literally blackened with rage”.
- Never My Fault: Evelyn, primary custodian of Sammy, blames his recent tendency to thievery on Creed.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed:
- Jovially averted, with cameos from George Melly, Anjelica Huston and Jack Nicholson.
- Aleister Crowley is depicted as having undergone occultic experimentation with the fictional Big Bad.
- Paparazzi: Creed is a cynical, often ruthless such specimen.
- The Prima Donna: Invoked, with Lily mentioned to have been a “queen bitch of the theatre.”
- Professional Killer: An elderly Henry Pink, imprisoned in squalor at the Mountjoy Retreat, recounts his 1939 hanging of Mallik.
- Really 700 Years Old: By occultic means, Mallik survived being hanged, and lived the next fifty-odd years with no further bodily ageing.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
- Creed forgets any thoughts of extortion when Mallik sets Bliss on him.
- Mallik, on discovery by the paparazzi of Lily’s botched resurrection, retreats to his basement throne room to incinerate himself and his collection of exotic artefacts.
- Sex Magic:
- Mallik’s seed initiates Lily’s eventual resurrection.
- From Creed’s ejaculate, Laura conjures “weanlings” , tiny spectral spores, apparently to aid her brief bout of shape shifting.
- Spooky Photographs: In several shots of Mallik, his gaze meets the camera with eerily blackened eyes.
- Toilet Seat Divorce: Lily Neverless had a tendency to this, having divorced a disabled, speech-impaired husband for alleged insensitivity.
- Toilet Horror: Creed’s toilet briefly grows teeth, which, with jaws of elongated porcelain, lunge forth.
- Would Hurt a Child: Just before World War II, Nicholas Mallick ritually murdered several children.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Creed jumps into a pond to evade Bliss, who, rather than actual vampirism, retains a form derived from traditional demonic conception.
- Your Mind Makes It Real: At the Mountjoy masque, many of the Fallen Angels, infused by collective faith, adapt forms traditionally accredited to their demonic progenitors. These evoke Frankenstein’s monster, a werewolf, and various fusions of man and beast.
