** So what is that Companion thing anyway?

The Vampire Companion (VC), like Anne's biography, was written by Katherine Ramsland. It's an encyclopedia of sorts for VampChron and offers such things as pictures (not of the characters though), maps, summaries of plots and trivia like what was written in the first draft of Interview that didn't make the final draft. Anne helped Katherine put it together, but the main work is Katherine's.

** What's that *other* Companion thing?

As of right now, there are two Anne Rice Vampire Companion books. Information about the second comes to us from Britton Trice of the Garden District Bookstore:
"The Vampire Companion is a new book edited by George Beahm. He has done similar books on Stephen King. The book is a compilation of old and new articles, essays, and reviews about Anne and her books. For example, the Playboy interview is included and an interview with me about the current prices of AR'S first editions. It is a limited edition of 500 hardbacks, numbered and signed by George Beahm and 3 other contributors including Katherine Ramsland. The limited edition sells for $35.00 and a custom made clear acrylic slipcase is available for $15.00- shipping is $5.50."

** Should I buy/read VC or Prism of the Night?

This question cannot be answered without giving an opinion of the two books. Originally I only included my opinion of the books but this caused something of a stir on alt.books.anne-rice since it was felt that giving only one opinion put too much of a slant on things. Since I agreed with that sentiment (and since Ian offered so nicely) here you will find two differing opinions about VC and Prism of the Night. Please keep in mind that these are only opinions and you can take them or leave them. If you have any questions, please direct them to the person who wrote each section.
Ian Wellock:

I liked VC. It has three main sections, the Entries A to Z, which covers a total of 484 pages (!), a Time Line, which starts at 'around 4000 B.C.' and goes up to 1992, the time of TotBT's publication, and also a Vampire Atlas, with some fascinating maps which is a nice touch for those of us mere mortals who have never been to New Orleans. There are a few errors, but I regard these as minor. (Details can be had upon request). For me, far and away the best reason for reading this book is the collection and cross-referencing of all the little items into many different subject areas, which, if you can't remember when a certain character made an appearance, or find out more about the Talamasca, is invaluable. I even like to sit down and just read the thing, and thereby pick up little snippets of information that perhaps were not immediately obvious.

Laura Troise:

I didn't like VC. For all the good that it offers (what is listed above) it offers a lot of garbage as well. It should be retitled "Katherine Ramsland's Interpretation of the Vampire Chronicles." Her opinion invades *everything*. This would be fine (after all, *my* opinion is all over this FAQ) except that *she gets things wrong while giving her opinion*. She has a Ph.D. in philosophy and has studied Jungian psychology but there's a very strong Freudian view throughout the book. She rips apart characters that she doesn't like and ignores what really happened in the books. Plus she gets basic facts wrong (like the names of characters) so you never know what bits of information to trust. VC is a fine book but it is in no way the "Official Guide to the Vampire Chronicles." It contains too many errors to be officially anything.

As for Prism of the Night, this is a slightly better book in comparison. Katherine's interpretation of Anne's books is still in there but you can pretty much ignore it while reading about Anne's life. The only problem is that Katherine is not a good writer (and I've had published authors agree with me on this) so you have to slog through a lot of bad prose to get to the gems of Anne's life.

Anne herself had this to say about Prism of the Night in CS#3:

"On my life: because you ask. There is Katherine Ramsland's PRISM OF THE NIGHT, a full scale biography with which I cooperated, but which I never sought to control. It's out there in paperback, and is fairly up to date. I have not read all of it. I mean it's my life, for God's sakes! But my father did read the first edition and approved of it before he died. Good enough for me."

In her conference on Compuserve, Anne said that she doesn't do final proof reads of the Companion books so this could account for the errors to be found within VC (I don't know enough about TWHC to comment on it one way or the other).

Finally, the word from Katherine herself. This was supplied to me via abar who got it from someone who was putting together a web page for Katherine. I'm sorry about the length and any spelling errors, but I was told I could only include it if I didn't edit it in any way and since I wanted to be sure I was letting all sides have a say, I thought it best to go with a slightly long rebuttal rather than no rebuttal at all.

"ARE THE COMPANION GUIDES REALLY OFFICAL???

Katherine: I suppose that, NO matter what I say, people will still believe their own theories - including the one that I don't really exist - but I did explain in the introductions to the books how Anne and I created the vision for the Guides together. She wanted them to be very detailed and rich with trivia and background, and she certainly supplied ALL of the quotes!

Also, I doubt that I could have put the original short story of Interview in the last book without Anne's approval (and prior approval of the other books).

I'm ALWAYS dismayed by readers who insists that I don't even KNOW Anne. It's a strange thing to say. On the other hand, perhaps their skepticism is a compliment to my imagination - to be able to make all that up and get away with publishing it!! Wow!

Anyway, Anne and I faxed each other back and forth (day and night) until she was happy with it. She served as a consultant THROUGHOUT - always providing quotes and resources to help me "track" her imagination. Admittedly, there is a certain amount of interpretation involved and I explained that in the introduction. If readers ask me why I said something in this way or that, I can almost ALWAYS defend it from the text of the novels. I tried very hard to make no personal judgement of characters, relying on judgements from the context of the novels- and providing references for them. Since most of the Chronicles are from Lestat's point of view, and since he viewed Armand as nihilistic and the "embodiment of thirst itself," that's what I wrote. And since Lestat (and ANNE!) viewed Louis as dependent and somewhat helpless and unwilling to use his full powers, that's the way I presented it.

I personally don't feel that way! I actually prefer Armand and Louis to Lestat. I have private opinions of what motivates them and what they might be outside Lestat's view, as I'm sure MANY other readers do! That's partly the fun of good fiction - to be able to take it beyond its apparent boundaries in the direction of one's own imagination. Only people who know me know my true opinions about the various characters.

If I've made mistakes in the text I've asked readers to let me know. It's a big job to write an encyclopedia and then to deal with editors and copy-editors (and even printers) who decide to change things without asking. I have tried very hard to be accurate because my intent was to provide Anne's readers with more background than they get in the novels - not just from research and travel but FROM ANNE HERSELF! I had hoped it would be fun for people to be able to see the paintings or landscapes she describes... to hear about her inspirations and to learn more about things to which she merely alludes in the novels.

Why did I say what I said about Armand in the revised Companion? BECAUSE THAT'S THE WAY ANNE FELT ABOUT IT WHEN WE WORKED ON THE REVISION, while MEMNOCH was still in manuscript form. ANNE is always free to change her mind and make revisions, but I GO (and have to) with what she's thinking AT THE TIME THAT THESE GUIDES ARE PREPARED FOR PRINT...

So that's the long way of saying YES, these books are QUITE official. ANd yes, I really exist!

Katherine"

** Isn't Prism of the Night out of date by now?

From what I've been told the current paperback copy of Prism of the Night has been updated to include things about TotBT, Lasher and Taltos (the original hardcover stopped before TotBT).

** What about an updated VC?

There is an updated VC. It's not in hardcover (which is good as that makes it cheaper) but it does include entries on MtD and even has a copy of the original short story that IWTV grew up to be. For obvious reasons I'm not going to spend my money on this book (see above) so I can't tell you if Katherine managed to fix any of the problems with the first VC.

** Can anyone else tell me if the problems were fixed?

Yes. Stephanie Buday had this to say:
"She didn't. I read through the revised VC at a bookstore a month or so ago. The entries are updated to include Memnoch, but other then that, it's *exactly* the same, inconsistancies included."

** What about that that Anne Rice Trivia book? Is it any good or what? You know?

I don't have the book myself, but Mishian kindly offered this review when it came out a few years ago:
"I bought the Anne Rice Trivia Book, on impulse, pulling things off the shelf in a stupor. When I got home I felt like a fool! Leafing through it, I couldn't help but think of those silly little tests from grade school-short answer, true/false, fill-in-the-blank, matching... The trivia book is mostly questions like "Who said this?" or "What was that?" I guess it's o.k. if you just want to go through and test how well you read (or memorized). Here is a sample question--> Julien claimed to be Antha's father- why is this impossible? Or match the hotel with the event that occured. Just when I thought this was a waste of $5.99, I noticed a section on Anne herself. It has cool little trivia bits like "What is her favorite chocolate bar?" Ans. Hershey's Milk Chocolate Symphony. I really like the section on Anne, but I'm still not sure the book was worth the amount I paid. It is copyrighted 1994, so I guess it is up to date."

** What about other Anne Rice companion books?

You can find information about Katherine Ramsland's other companion books in part 2 of the FAQ under the appropriate sections, and there is information about more general Anne Rice related books in the "From One Fan to Another" section, under "Other than the Ramsland and Beahm books, are there any other Anne related books?"

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