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Paperback Let Me in Book

ISBN: 0312656491

ISBN13: 9780312656492

Let Me in

(Book #1 in the Let the Right One In Series)

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Format: Paperback

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Book Overview

John Ajvide Lindqvist's vampire novel Let Me In was adapted into an award-winning Swedish movie and made into an American film and is now a TV show available to stream on Showtime

It is autumn 1981 when inconceivable horror comes to Blackeberg, a suburb in Sweden. The body of a teenager is found, emptied of blood, the murder rumored to be part of a ritual killing. Twelve-year-old Oskar is personally hoping that revenge has...

Customer Reviews

3 ratings

Lucky is he who has such a friend

Vampire stories tend to come in two flavours -- either they're creepy horor stories, or celebrations of goth hotties tortured by their immortality. But John Ajvide Lindqvist's "Let The Right One In" is neither kind or story. Instead this haunting, atmospheric Swedish movie is a poignant look at a very unique friendship between a young boy and a vampire child. His spare prose has a haunting poetic edge even in the violent scenes, and is littered with moments of pure creepiness and beauty. A man and a young girl have moved into the apartment next to Oskar's. But he's more concerned with the savage bullies that attack him every single day. But as he vents his frustrations by stabbing a tree, he sees a ghostly young girl named Eli, who informs him that she can't be his friend. She turns out to be as much of an oddball as Oskar -- especially since she only ventures out at night, smells like death, and is unaffected by the winter cold. But despite her odd greeting, the two strike up an innocent friendship. At the same time, her servant Hakan is going around town killing young boys for Eli's sake, and trying to blackmail her into sleeping with him in exchange for blood. Oskar realizes that Eli is a bona fide vampire -- and not really a girl -- but doesn't intend to let that get in the way of their puppy love. Yet when Hakan's errands go horribly awry, Oskar finds himself to be the only person Eli can rely on. Trust me, "Let the Right One In" has no sentimental ideas about children (even vampiric ones) -- they can be more violent than anyone, because they are more vulnerable. The adults are all distant and/or alcoholic, leaving the children to fend for themselves -- which makes the tender, clumsy connection between Eli and Oskar all the more striking. The plot starts out slow, with Oskar expressing his anger and loneliness in violent fantasies, and Hakan being all creepy and pedophiley as he harvests blood for Eli. The story gradually grows tenser and more murky as the tensions grow more overpowering, leading to a gruesome clash in a cold swimming pool (with shattered glass "over the water like myriad white stars"). While Lindqvist's prose also starts out stark and spare, it becomes more dreamlike and haunting once Eli and Oskar start meeting at night. The words become more poetic ("Her fingers were long and slender as twigs), and even the brutality of Eli feeding off a teenage boy is written beautifully. Simultaneously, Lindqvist pares down the conversations between Hakan and Eli to mere brief exchanges, and thus keeping Eli's true nature a mystery. And Lindqvist does a brilliant job with the vampiric angle. It's eerie rather than bloody or scary, and he manages to come up with some new twists (Eli's "dead" smell and matted hair). But this book's heart is the bittersweet, strangely innocent romance between Eli and Oskar -- they play with puzzles, laugh on the swings, and listen to each other through the walls. And their moments of violence --

Victims and Victimizers

Let the Right One In, by John Ajvide Lindovist. has one fantastic element: vampires. It's set in a suburb of Stockholm, on a social housing development that has become a sink estate. It's a sad place, full of aimless people. The people with responsibility - teachers, policemen, parents, are, for the most part, trying to do the right thing. They've got good intentions. The book has a huge cast of characters with the major division between adults and children, each subdivided into the successful, more or less, and the failures, with a further division into victims and victimizers. The book opens with a bullied child, Oskar, who fantasizes about becoming a mass murderer. He meets Elli, a child vampire. The predictable does not happen. Many of the adults on the estate are as powerless as the children - lonely, middle aged and elderly alcoholics, unemployed or working at minimum wage jobs. They are presented with a moral choice similar to that of the children: even if a victim, one can refuse to victimize others. (And that is the major freedom the characters in the book have.) An earlier reviewer said he/she wasn't sure if this was belonged in horror... it's horror in the same way that Henry James' ghost stories fit the genre. It's mainstream/literary/horror, a book that crosses boundaries. I think genres are more useful for finding a kind of reading than describing a book - essentially, this is a very good book that people who read horror and people who would never consider reading horror would both like. It doesn't rank highly on the 'feel good factor' but it has a surprisingly happy ending -- one of those 'happy endings' that is about as happy as, all things considered, an ending can be. I loved it - and think it's one of the best books I've read in the past year or so.

A riveting, tense thriller

Set in Sweden in 1981, LET ME IN provides a riveting, tense thriller revolving around a dead teen and a possible ritual murder spree. Add a pre-teen who hopes revenge has come for the bullying he's suffered and a strange new girl who moves in next door, who only comes out at night, and you have a vampire novel to rival Anne Rice's best: a tense thriller recommended for any general lending library where patrons request powerful characterization and vampire novels.

Let the Right One in Mentions in Our Blog

Let the Right One in in 11 Bloodcurdling Book-to-Screen Horror Adaptations
11 Bloodcurdling Book-to-Screen Horror Adaptations
Published by Ashly Moore Sheldon • October 29, 2023

Adapting literary horror to the screen is tricky. Sometimes it means staying faithful to the original text. But sometimes the director must take some liberties with the source material. Here are eleven of our favorite book-to-screen horror adaptations.

Let the Right One in in 11 Books to Read if You Love Stranger Things
11 Books to Read if You Love Stranger Things
Published by Ashly Moore Sheldon • June 30, 2022

If you're a typical Stranger Things fan, you may soon be looking for some entertainment to fill the demogorgon-sized hole left in your life after binging season four. Here are eleven recommendations for books that offer that same retro supernatural vibe.

Let the Right One in in Autumn Vibes: 12 Moody Novels for Fall
Autumn Vibes: 12 Moody Novels for Fall
Published by Ashly Moore Sheldon • September 23, 2021

From cozy to creepy, we've assembled a fall reading list that's perfect for curling up under a wooly blanket with a mug of hot tea in your hand. Hopefully there's something here that satisfies your autumnal mood.

Let the Right One in in Book to Movie: The Snowman and Wonderstruck
Book to Movie: The Snowman and Wonderstruck
Published by Bianca Smith • October 19, 2017

Fans of Norwegian writer Jo Nesbø have probably shuddered at the terrifying thriller, The Snowman, being brought to life on screen. It’s definitely not a novel to be read alone at night.

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