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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 895.636
EAN num: 9781595820938
ISBN number: 1595820930
Label: Dark Horse Books/Digital Manga Publishing
Manufacturer: Dark Horse Books/Digital Manga Publishing
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 276
Printing Date: June 07, 2006
Publishing house: Dark Horse Books/Digital Manga Publishing
Sale Popularity Level: 154706
Studio: Dark Horse Books/Digital Manga Publishing
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When a floating city becomes the target of a rash of vampire attacks, only one man can restore the oasis. 'The City,' a tiny metropolis of a few hundred sheltered citizens floating serenely on a seemingly random course a few feet above the ground, has long been thought safe from the predation of marauding monsters. It seemed like a paradise. A paradise shattered when an invasion of apparent vampires threatens the small haven. While the Vampire Hunter known only as 'D' struggles to exterminate the scourge, a former denizen of the city, the attractive Raleigh Knight, and the brash John M. Brassalli Pluto VIII seize control of the city lurching it onto a new and deadly course. D's travails are just beginning.
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Rated by buyers -
Vampire Hunter D is one of those vampiric characters who clings to the imagination -- a chilly, powerful dhampir with a big hat and sword.
And Hideyuki Kikuchi is still in pretty good shape in D's fourth fantasy adventure. "Vampire Hunter D Volume 4: Tale of the Dead Town" is more of a mystery than straight sci-fi horror, and while it lacks the visceral punch of Kikuchi's other work about his postapocalyptic dhampir, it's still a solid story with some solid action scenes, and a glimpse of D's life as a wandering Hunter.
As the story opens, D rescues the lone survivor of a dragon massacre -- a radiation-sick teenage girl named Lori -- and a brash biker named John M. Brasselli Pluto VIII.
With his two new companions, D arrives at a very unique town -- it floats above the ground, and constantly travels. Compared to the rest of the Frontier, it's pretty idyllic, except that the mayor's daughter has been attacked by the Nobility. At very first D thinks that the place has been invaded by a lone Noble, but when he kills the vampire he finds that the man is not the only one in the floating city.
And he finds that something strange is lurking in Lori's old home, where her father was conducting some odd experiments. Using John's special talents -- possessing the minds of others -- D soon discovers just what Lori's father was trying to create all those years, and who is responsible for the vampire attacks. To make matters worse, the city is going waaaaaayyy off course toward some Noble ruins...
Hideyuki Kikuchi has explored the horrors that science can create before, even in a series with vampires, mutants, and monsters of assorted types. And "Tale of the Dead Town" straddles the line between horror and mystery -- not mystery of the Agatha Christie type with subtle clues and many suspects, but more of a Raymond Chandler dig-up-the-dirty-nasty-facts pulp variety.
With that in mind, "Tale of the Dead Town" unwinds at a relatively relaxed pace, with D poking around in dark corners and fending off the bigotry of the locals. Kikuchi's shadowy, lushly detailed descriptions lend themselves well to the eerier scenes -- such as the vampire girl's creepy multiple-personality moment -- as well as the action sequences. One particularly striking scene is D's battle against some vicious carnivorous birds to save a little girl.
There are a few bumps in the literary road, though -- Kikuchi's detailed writing sometimes goes a bit over the top ("vermillion rage" in someone's voice?), and he reminds us at least every two pages about how unspeakably gorgeous D is.
Though D claims he's "seen too much" to react to his surroundings, Kikuchi keeps his anti-hero from becoming a cardboard cutout. He spends most of the book being chilly and remote, but occasionally comes out of his shell -- his unacknowledged with the brash, talkative John M. Brasselli Pluto VIII is a particularly fun one, since the men are utter opposites. At the same time, we get a glimpse at the mindless hostility he's been hit with for centuries.
"Vampire Hunter D Volume 4: Tale of the Dead Town" is one of Kikuchi's lesser works, but it's still a solid horror/mystery tale of a hi-tech city that is rotting from the inside out.
Rated by buyers -
This book would definitely make a great anime movie. The story is action-packed and full of unexpected twists and turns. However for me it was not as exciting as the second and third novel, may be because of the fact that it was all action and no feelings. I personally like to see a softer side of D. As much as I love reading all Kikuchi's novels I still don't understand why D enjoys hunting Nobles and protecting humans despite of the fact that humans are always trying to kill him one way or the other. Maybe we'll find out by the end of 17th novel...
Rated by buyers 
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This story literally blew me away. No matter what I thought was going to happen, every other page just surprised me again with a new plot twist. This story was just excellent, and definately worth buying to be read over and over again.
Rated by buyers 
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While Dead Town does not outshine Volumes 1 and 3 of the series, it does however work well in the series. D's character, while still cold, is starting to develope into a person that can in fact, partner up from time to time with other characters in the story.
The twist at the end of the novel however is pretty obvious, and it has been a staple of the series to have a hidden villain turn out to be one of the "good guys" that are trying to help D. The true easter egg of the story however is the reference to a previous book, in which the fate of a popular character is revealed. That fact definatley makes it a must read.
All in all it was a quick and pleasant read; and I still look forward to the subsequent installment.
Rated by buyers -
One of my very very first exposures to Anime came in the late 80's and the wonderfully atmospheric Vampire Hunter D. Oh sure I had seen Robotech and Speed Racer and the like, but this was truly unlike anything I had ever seen before. Dark Horse Press and Digital Manga Publishing have joined together to bring the fantastic Vampire Hunter D novels to American audiences for the very first time. Originally written some 20 years ago by Hideyuki Kikuchi, "Tale of the Dead Town" is thus far the fourth book in the series to be released.
As the story opens, D comes upon a lone biker out on the frontier defending an injured teenaged girl in what remains of her family's RV from a flock of Dragons. Only D's intervention saves the pair but the girl, Lori Knight, is badly injured, and her parents are killed. Along with the biker, Pluto, D leads them to a great city that hovers several feet off the ground on a large disk. D has been hired by the mayor of the town to seek out and destroy the vampire that attacked his daughter. Lori's suffered radiation poisoning causing her to lose her hearing and speech. D soon finds out that Lori and her family once lived in this floating town but left recently.
D finds that the Knight's old house has been locked up tightly by the town's sheriff, but D manages to get inside and finds a secret laboratory that lori's parents used. And he also encounters something else...a shadowy shape that quickly flees from the Hunter. D is hardly welcomed by the townspeople who consider the dhampir to be just as much of a threat as any other vampire. Soon a body turns up, completely drained of blood. Everyone believes it is obviously the work of the vampire and yet an investigation of the body shows no bite mark at all. And yet, not longer after the body is buried, it rises from the grave, intent on killing D.
D now finds himself not only hunting a vampire, but also trying to solve the mystery of how the man turned into a vampire without being bitten. And what is the secret to the experiments the Knights were working on and why did they flee the safe haven of the town.
Tale of the Dead Town is much like the D anime, more of an adventure story with horror elements to it. In the postscript to the story, Kikuchi talks about how he was influenced, in particular by the Hammer Dracula films and Christopher Lee. This is reflected in his writing although the character of D is vastly powerful and you really get the feeling that not much can challenge this avenger of the night. Tale of the Dead Town skillfully wove both a horror and a mystery tale and sprinkled it with liberal action scenes to make for one heckuva enjoyable story. Kikuchi's prose is quite colorful and descriptive. It's a quick read at 167 pages and as a bonus the very first chapter of the subsequent book, "The Stuff of Dreams" is included as a preview.
Reviewed by Tim Janson
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