Book Review: Village of the Vampire Cat

[osprey_archer]

My most recent used bookstore trip paid off with a treasure: Lensey Namioka’s Village of the Vampire Cat, one of the books in her Zenta and Matsuzo series, which is about two ronin (masterless samurai) traveling through Japan righting wrongs.

I read these books as a teenager and remembered them as very slashy, but either this is the least slashy book in the series or I read them the first time with slash goggles firmly affixed to my face, as Village of the Vampire Cat don’t strike me that way this time around. It was still a lot of fun, though! In this book, Zenta and Matsuzo are going to visit Zenta’s old tea master, Ikken, only to discover that Ikken’s village has been beset by a series of murders of young girls, caused by… the vampire cat! Zenta and Matsuzo set out to solve the mystery of who and what this vampire cat is.

Although Namioka’s prose is workmanlike in this series (my recollection is that it’s much smoother in her later books, like Yang the Youngest and His Terrible Ear, although again it’s been years since I read it), the settings and social customs are evocatively described - the tea ceremony in particular is so soothing and peaceful even to read about.

And of course we have Zenta, my forever fave, an honorable warrior type who strives to live up to the highest ideals of his culture, which always gets me even if the ideals are not my ideals, indeed are at times completely opposite to my ideals. Is it really for the best that the only way a samurai can reprimand his superior is hara kiri? Hash, but that’s the way things are done, and Zenta is ready to do it! (As there are six books in the series, I think it’s not a spoiler to tell you that events intervene to stop him.)

I’m looking forward to finding the other books. My recollection is that some of them have a high hurt/comfort quotient, most especially Island of Ogres, which features feverish Zenta! concerned about missing Matsuzo! and also a Cottia-type fiery heroine! who, if I recall correctly, gets to take more part in the action than Cottia does. There’s definitely a scene where the women of the household are gathered together with their weapons, ready for a last-ditch defense if it comes to it - just as the women take part in the final battle with the bandits in Village of the Vampire Cat.

And I do have a special June-only gift card at Half-Price books… Maybe time to start hitting up some of the other locations around town.

Comments

[troisoiseaux]

Lensey Namioka’s Village of the Vampire Cat ... which is about two ronin (masterless samurai) traveling through Japan righting wrongs.

That is not a premise I would ever have guessed based on the title, but it sounds like fun!!

[osprey_archer]

Yes, that title would absolutely lead you to expect a completely different book if you didn't know that it was part of this particular series. I wonder how many people picked it up and were all WHERE IS VAMPIRE??

[asakiyume]

Tea ceremonies can be high stress because they're so formalized, but they can sometimes be like you describe, really lovely and soothing.

Good luck tracking down the others!

[osprey_archer]

The impression I got in the book is that the tea ceremony is a bit like dancing - stressful when you're still learning the steps, but once you've got it, it sort of picks you up and carries you away. Although dancing usually doesn't carry you away to someplace soothing! So very different in that sense.