The Rovers Return: The Official Coronation Street Companion

Product Information

There's little worse to the speculative fiction reader than a literary fiction writer who takes on the genre in an attempt to somehow "elevate" it. Conversely, magic happens when a literary fiction writer slides seamlessly into the genre not to prove something, but because that's where the story lies.

The characters are all very three dimensional, and with few exceptions, solicit pity from the reader. Funny enough, the one human point of view we get got the least sympathy from me, since he has spent his life (after the murder of his son) on the road searching for his killers. This guy abandons his grieving wife, has no money or prospects and no hope of anything other than the vilest of revenge. I can't get behind that. There's a lot to like about this book. Despite being a vampire tale, it's told in a very literary voice. There are three narratives, one of which belongs to a human hunting the vamps, which is relayed in epistolary fashion, much like Stoker's. It's set in 1976. The vamps portrayed in Lang's version are human in every way except their inability to die by ordinary means, sunlight aversion and, oh yes, the need to feed on human blood. These vamps need feed only once a month, with the exception of infant blood, which will sustain them for a year. I have to admit, that's something I found silly.It will include the latest action both on and off the cobbles, what you thought about the soap's top storylines and what the stars are up to away from the set. Plus much more! I love how Lange describes this book as Of Mice and Men with vampires. BOOM! I think that says it all. He gives us four points of view that slowly weave together to form one big, bad, bloody showdown in 1970s Vegas. I mean come on…what better place for the big bad to go down than Vegas, baby.

The nitty-gritty: A unique take on vampires, Rovers is an outstanding blood-soaked, tragic tale of revenge and redemption. Lange has a neat and visually descriptive writing style, which for me made this feel quite cinematic. Rovers reads like a Tarantino film looks and unfolds. Stylishly gritty, populated by archetype characters simultaneously larger than life and accurately reflective of reality, punctuated and ultimately defined by outrageous yet deftly framed violence. The newsletter will land in your inbox on a Friday and bring you the highlights of everything we've written about Weatherfield that week.Some Coronation Street viewers are eager to snap up the Rovers Return after it was put up for sale. Light and dark have to hold hands to show their true natures. Same goes for people. These characters wrestle with the little devil in all our souls. Come see if anyone survives to live—truly live--another day or night. For me, vampire tales teach the break out of the self-imposed boxes we tend to put ourselves in lesson oh-so perfectly. We’re not dead yet. Or are we?