Book Review: Peeps by Scott Westerfeld

I am officially in love with Scott Westerfeld. I do not mean a homosexual love, but I absolutely and utterly adore this man’s writing. As some of you already know, I truly enjoyed reading the first book in the Midnighter’s series, of which I am going to be reading book two eventually here. Peeps is yet another one of Westerfeld’s brilliant literary works. The difference here is that Peeps is a completely new and realistic take on the traditional vampire story. Now, hold on for a second. I know what some are thinking. “Oh no, not another god awful piece of garbage vampire story.” No sir, this is not another one of those. In fact this isn’t even a vampire story at all.
The story:
Cal Thompson’s life has changed forever. He’s been infected with a horrible virus during a one night stand after a night out at the bar. But he’s lucky; he’s a carrier. He shows none of the signs of usual parasite positives–a.k.a. Peeps. He’s sane, he’s not trying to bite people, and he doesn’t have crazy infected rats following him around. But Cal has infected all his previous girlfriends due to not even knowing that he was infected in the first place. His job, as part of a secret underground group known as the Night Watch, is to hunt down and capture these people before their madness spawns more Peeps to terrorize society in the dark.

Now, obviously I cannot give you more detail than that because that would give away far too much about the story. All I can say is that it is far deeper than that. Imagine what your life would be like if you could never resume a normal relationship with someone of the opposite sex ever again?
Once again Westerfeld has put together a cast of amazing characters. Cal is amazing. He’s real. He acts exactly how I would expect a person in his position to. Lace too. And there are surprises throughout the story. Just when you think things are going in one direction they take a turn in the opposite. The parasite is, well, rather hardy and versatile.
To add, Westerfeld has been truly kind to offer interesting blurbs on real parasites in this world to add more credibility to the story. Every other chapter has a new parasite to discuss. This isn’t a medical journal, but Westerfeld manages to tell you what these real parasites do without making your head spin with medical jargon. Then you start to sit back and think that this horrible parasite in the story could actually exist.
The pacing is spot on too. There was no time in the story that I felt like taking a break. I finished 99% of it this weekend and only read a little on Thursday during break at work. The story kept me intrigued. I found myself going back to or three times in a couple hours even though I had so many other things to do. You start to really connect with Cal.
The ending is rather different too. You do see it coming, but Westerfeld leaves the story open for a sequel–which there is. I’m looking forward to reading that edition too!
This a must read in my opinion!