Frank Schildiner brings us his second novel about Napolean‘s Vampire Hunters, The Devil Plague of Naples. Published by Black Coat Press, these works make use of characters and settings created by Paul Feval, all reprinted by BCP as well.
First off, of course, are Feval’s trio of vampire novels written before Dracula. Also used are characters from The Companion of the Silence, which would later be tied into his crime novel series The Black Coats, including Michele Bozzo, a.k.a. Fra Diavolo.
If you missed those works, we get a great introduction by Jean-Marc Lofficier and an afterward by Schildiner in The Devil Plague of Naples that gives us a good background on Feval’s vampires and the Black Coats, and the other sources for the novel.
Jean-Pierre Severin comes from Feval’s The Vampire Countess, while exorcist Franz von Karnstein comes from Le Fanu‘s Camilla (another vampire tale that pre-dates Dracula) by way of a trio of Hammer films. New characters Sylvia Darnia and her father, Bartolomeo, add to the mix. They are more original, though have their influences which you can read about in the afterward. Barto Darnia is another swordmaster and killer of vampires, who had studied swordmanship with Severin.
Schildiner’s book is set in 1806 in the Kingdom of Naples, which was a “client state” of Napoleon’s. So when we have another outbreak of the undead and vampires (but a different type this time), we again have our heroes sent there to take care of it. They are joined by the Darnias, and they could use the help. This is because matters are complicated by a variety of things.
We have political intrigue with both corrupt police officials (there is both a regular and a secret police, and they don’t necessarily work together) and criminal elements including Fra Diavolo himself, all of whom take an interest in the group. And more sinister supernatural forces than have been faced before are behind all of this. Will everyone get out of this alive?
It’s clear at many points that Schildiner’s knowledge of martial arts comes in handy for certain scenes.
Hopefully we’ll see a third novel with these characters, and I think Schildiner has some ideas for that. There is a clear setup at the end for more, with hints of the vampire city (also from Feval) being given.
I also advise checking out his other works from Black Coat Press. Schildiner has done two novels using Gouroull, an evil version of Frankenstein’s monster, with a third coming later this year, and also has a new novel that just came out using an alternate-world version of Irma Vep from Les Vampires, actually a group of criminals, not more undead.
