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A Prescription For Delirium (2000)

by Noree Cosper(Favorite Author)

3.86 of 5 Votes: 5

languge

English

genre

Horror

series

A Van Helsing Organization

review 1: For me the word Van Helsing in the title is a bit of a misnomer. You would be forgiven for thinking this is just another novel about vampires, you'd be wrong, it's demonic possession. It may have been a coincidence, but for the two weeks I read this book I had a really bad time. Did the book make that much of an impact, or am I just paranoid? I don't know, but things have settled down now.I've read Christian books on demonic possession, but this one is far more detailed in dark research and perhaps that's what makes it different and interesting. The story starts in Rome 1536, but this is merely to give us some background about Gabriella and the first time she meets the demon Ose. She has been cursed with immortality and even when she is killed she is reborn. This allows he... morer to have had a past with Dimitri in 1920's Paris, great grandfather to Esais, Tres and Adrian Van Helsing. The difference and characteristics of these three brothers are really endearing. Esais is the older protector of the clan who has telepathic powers and for most women it is a shame he prefers men. Tres is the opposite, a ladies man and charmer with healing powers. Trained as a doctor he uses traditional medicine first in order not to draw attention to his gift. Adrian is the rebel, gifted in science he is both suspicious and doesn't believe in giftings. When he discovers his brothers have these gifts he is appalled. There is a real tension between Adrian and Gabriella which starts with hostility and matures into tolerance if not outright care. Adding to these characters is another demon hunter Marge. She is very much characterised by her aggressive stance, her questioning of the demon possessed boy shows her brutality and love of pain. Later when faced with a house full of demons Gabrielle insists on rescuing the hostages rather than simply burning the place down. In this sense Marge becomes a foil for Gabrielle, she is the brutal contrast, the line Gabrielle will not cross. Yet we never seem to get to the bottom of her motivation. She is looking for a particular demon, but why?John is Gabriella's lover interest. Despite having killed his demon possessed wife, he is still desperate to be her lover. He performs the scientific role, making alchemical compounds to kill the hell hound. Confident in his own allure, he is able to call her a liar when she rebuffs his advances, finally giving in to her desire before the end of the novel.Ose and Malantha, his daughter are the two main satanic protagonists in the novel. Relatively speaking we don't see that much of them, but we see their influence and in this sense this is the crux of demonic possession. While Malantha runs the fortune telling at the carnival, Ose is the head physician at the mental hospital. It would be easy to fall into a cliché here and incorrectly label all mental patients as demoniacally possessed, but the few patients that are shown in the novel, are overcome by their hosts in horrible ways. The sickening yellow mist of madness covers the whole town and manifests itself in more aggressive and paranoid tendencies. Indeed Nancy, the police officer who investigates the disturbance at the bar, in the beginning of the novel, becomes more paranoid and aggressive throughout the book. When confronted with the hellhound she becomes almost hysterical, firing bullets at it which seem to have no effect.Gabrielle's hallucinations, in a chapter towards the end of the book, are written in italics in order to distinguish them from the rest of the action. I have heard it suggested that all thoughts should be put in italics, to help the reader distinguish between inner and outer voice, but I disagree with this and better writing should make the distinction apparent. After saying that, the chapter in italics works well as an aside. Here we learn more about her past and Allegra's influence. How the death of those she has loved, has become her motivation for the demon hunter she now is and why the Van Helsings are so important to her.The end of the novel does give us a sense of good triumphing over evil. However it also leaves us with a suggestion that Ose is not the chief, but merely the puppet of some higher power. In that sense we gain a satisfying ending to the book, but also the promise of more to come. This novel lacks the poetry and depth of a classic novel, but it's an interesting story with thoughtful characterisation. Lovers of dark fiction will like this and don't be put off by the title, this is not just another vampire book.
review 2: I will refrain from quotes and excerpts of the story, just because there is plenty of that in here already. I'm going to start with the positive.The overall story is very good with some great concepts. Cosper did a really good job description, every scene was well thought out and easy to imagine. The action was also really well done, with at least decent characters (see below.) The author should feel very proud for what she has accomplished in writing this story. No matter how you look at it, it’s a good book and well worth the read for anyone interested in super natural or dark fantasy fiction. Also any fan of action I think would enjoy the story. The author did a wonderful job on each and every one of those, I have read some terrible action and then I have read some glazed over hardly making it work action, and I would rate hers up there some of the best. Unfortunately, there are a number of negatives to talk about too though. Most of which are just my nit picking though. I do wanna state before i go into that none of these hurt the story in any way for me. The writing style: Personally, I don't like first person view in writing, and I was a little disappointed to find that it is in fact a first person book. However, Cosper does a good job with it so it wasn't detrimental to the story. In most cases, the main character is never by herself so you almost don't notice it. Another thing that stood out to me was she tends to reuse words and phrases a lot. In one instance, she used the word "ground" about three times in one small paragraph. Stuff like that can make the writing feel jarring. Over all the writing was good but it could have been cleaned up a lot. Another small issue i had was sometimes I couldn't tell who was speaking due to a lacking in speech tags, but again it didn't hurt the story much. The cast: While each character is enjoyable, as a male reader, i felt that the male characters where quite honestly wimpy. Still likable of course but all three brothers I felt really needed to grow a set so to speak. Thankfully, they are redeemed at the end when they all come together in the final action scene. Otherwise, that's really the only negatives that i can think of. As for recommending the book, I would and plan to recommend it to people I know.As a final note, I wanted to say, this is a book that I really wish I could have seen as a movie. With the action the way it was and the concept, I feel that it would have been really neat to watch, when done by the right people that is. Or even an anime would have been really neat. less

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