Durham Red #5: Black Dawn

The mutant vampire Durham Red and her traveling companions on the starship Omega Fury, Matteus Godolkin and Judas Harrow, are trapped in the seemingly lifeless zone of space known as the Manticore Gulf. Life there was destroyed by Brite Red, a future version of Durham Red that Durham Red had been force to exterminate (time travel and cryopreservation make for interesting story-lines). Still, they are caught by the blockade thrown up around the Gulf by the Bastion. An attempt to leave fails and has them further stranded on the supposedly technologically backward planet of Purity and now the Omega Fury is a ship with no power source to get it going again. All is not as it seems and they are quickly embroiled, regardless of their desires, in the treacherous politics of the planet and, if that weren't enough, they are simultaneously trying to define and defeat an unknown threat that has been tearing asunder unfortunate locals. **** Durham Red's character is a 1980s spin off from the old Strontium Dog comics, circa 1978 (the nuclear war on Earth that created the vampire Durham Red spawned the Search/Destroy Agency that tracked criminals and these agents, e.g. Red's late love, Johnny Alpha, were called the Strontium Dogs), but Peter J. Evans' (you may associate that name with one of the Judge Dredd stories) series of novels have breathed new life into the old girl. If you haven't read the previous books, this novel will stand alone, but I suspect that many folks will find themselves 'sucked' into Red's universe and will out looking for the other of Evans' novels in this series: The Unquiet Grave (August 2004 ISBN 1-84416-159-5); # The Omega Solution (May 2005 ISBN 1-84416-175-7); The Encoded Heart (October 2005 ISBN 1-84416-272-9); Manticore Reborn (January 2006 ISBN 1-84416-323-7). After all, Durham Red is pretty likeable when compared to bloodsuckers such as the IRS and other government agencies. **** Reviewed by Dr. Phil Rhyne.