The vampire is the most glamorous and iconic of Gothic figures. In
Night's Black Agents
, editor Daniel Corrick assembles a baker's dozen of tales that trace the sanguinary path of this thirsty, mythical creature from the early nineteenth century, where it acted as an incarnation of fears of libertinism and diabolism, appearing as the Satanic villain in penny dreadfuls, through to the early twentieth century, where it appeared as both
femme fatale
and homoerotic bloodsucker.
This volume of stories, often perverse and even more often cruel, includes pieces by authors both famous and unknown, such as Alexander Dumas, Thomas Pecket Prest, Leonhard Stein, and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, and features a number of rare, never anthologized items, thus showcasing in lusts for blood and doomed devouring loves, the infernal miracle that is the vampire.