Until Summer Comes Around by Glenn Rolfe

I would like to thank Flame Tree Press for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – Flame Free Press

Published – Out Now

Price - £9.95 paperback £5.72 Kindle eBook

Old Orchard Beach, Maine, summer, 1986. The pier, the tourists, the sunshine. It’s all perfect…for something in need of blood.

For fifteen-year-old Rocky, summer is when the beachside town he lives in comes to life. But this summer brings her. When a mysterious girl named November walks into Rocky’s world, the young couple quickly fall in love, but not everyone approves. November’s brother is the keeper of the family’s horrifying secret, and big brother is always watching.

Growing up is hard – learning who you are, managing the joys of hormones, first love and dealing with seeing the world as an adult for the first time are all difficult hurdles to get over. But add in murderous vampires and things get just that little harder. In Glenn Rolfe’s Until Summer We Come Around we have a bittersweet horror tale of growing up in the America of the 1980’s where a young man finds that the first love of his life may also be responsible for the end of it.

Rocky in the summer of 1986 is about to turn 16. The two biggest hurdles in his life are having to wear a painful and embarrassing brace to help his spine grow and learning to drive for that all-important car for freedom. His best friend is going away for a few months, so he looks a little lost. Then he meets November a smart, gorgeous girl who despite his inability to talk upon first meeting is happy to keep meeting him. But Old Orchard Beach which for years has been viewed as a very safe place for everyone is being hit by a plague of disappearances particularly of young teenagers in the night. November’s family is hiding a secret and her brother Gabriel is not happy to find out where his sister is spending all her time. November and Gabriel are vampires and the latter is starting to push the boundaries of what he can get away with thanks to his unique powers.

What I really enjoyed about this tale was the atmosphere that Rolfe has created for the story. It would be tempting to go a little too much 80’s style blood spatter horror or perhaps a bit too rock opera (the introduction pays tribute to the Lost Boys) but this actually avoids an overly broody hero. Instead it captures that feeling of the long last summer where you start to realise you aren’t a kid any longer. A lot of that comes from the lead character Rocky – he’s a fairly average teenage boy. Rolfe captures the teenage male mix of childlike fun (wanting to play video games in the arcade); some fairly embarrassing moments trying to impress November and yet he’s actually a fairly decent kid. He’s not an intrepid adventurer his family is actually fairly normal (I loved how Rolfe painted them not as dysfunctional but just that normal mix of them being deliberately embarrassing, awkward and still loving especially to Rocky’s first girlfriend) and he’s honest - a key scene is him admitting his disability. This is very much about Rocky becoming an adult. Happily, despite my pet hate of instalove raising its head I also liked that Rolfe gave November a lot of character. Despite her vampiric nature she’s someone looking to find life rather than blood and Rocky is bringing a warmth she can’t get back home. November has agency and is actually the more grown up/smarter in the relationship couple which is quite refreshing.

Adding the horror to the tale is Gabriel who is something much more malevolent. Gabriel is breaking the vampire code and fully feasting on human blood and a murder spree begins in earnest. Rolfe’s spin on vampires are creatures more powerful at night but can still walk in the day; able to fly and full of inhuman speed and strength – especially when engorged on human blood. Clad in black and enjoying his superiority to the ‘blood bags’ he walks amongst he is utterly evil and yet doesn’t move into caricature. There is an interesting angle about how Gabriel has fallen into a cycle of addiction and just ends up hurting all he loves with eh more blood he tastes. When he gets into any scene we move from romance into horror and we watch a number of victim’s final moments where Rolfe has a good ear for the unnerving and the tragic as people we know for a few pages meet their ends. Its always effective horror when you get an enemy who you actually feel can win and Gabriel’s unpredictability and cruelness really help make the heart stopping finale deliciously tense.

All of this get wrapped in a mid-80’s atmosphere. There is a clearly a lot of affection for the era within the tale with the music, radio and food getting highlighted prominently. I’d only have been ten and in the UK at the time but this does capture the small town America we were always getting shown at the time in TV and film and I liked how the Beach is made to come to life in the story a lot. I’d probably have liked to explore the place a little more than just the three main characters but hey I’m a King fan on horror towns – I’m used to knowing everyone’s history for generations.

This was a really enjoyable read where I loved how Rolfe mixed coming of age with horror so effectively. While clearly in love with the period it avoids the shallowness of some teen horror films at the time instead giving us interesting characters a very difficult situation to escape from as well as a lot of character growth. Love can hurt but vampire fangs are much much worse. One to look out for!