For fans of Empire of the Vampire, The First Law Trilogy, The Broken Empire, and Game of Thrones.

Culling of the House of Boars is a descent into darkness where ancient vampire clans wage brutal wars among themselves, their hunger for power rivaling their thirst for human blood. Strigoi.

Living dead monstrosities haunting the villages and byways of Romania and Eastern Europe for over two millennia, shunning the sun and preying upon the blood of the living. They are a thing of nightmare, born of ancient dark arts and created to instill fear in the hearts of the invaders of their ancestral lands.

What you see is only a hateful remnant of what once incited such terror in the heart of Rome that Emperor Aurelian withdrew his legions from the frontier for fear of them. They hunt in the shadows of your world now, but once they roamed these lands like vengeful gods.

You see, the strigoi are an invasive species and have no natural predators. They are the locust in the wheat field of humanity.

I know this, for I am Adaric, Culling Master of the House of Boars.

And I am strigoi.

Fun short read. Moves fast and delivers a punch.

I have a special place in my heart for vampires, so when I saw a promo for this book on Insta by Jack Finn, I knew I had to pick it up. And it turned out to be just the kind of action-packed grimdark read I enjoy. Flew through it in a day.

As the blurb outlines, the story is about strigoi—vampires, fearsome and brutal. After a period of bloodbath and internal rivalry, they now strictly regulate their population, and are organized in houses kept in check by the mortal priestesses of a dark god. Their ability to annihilate vampires with just a word enforces some semblance of hierarchy, though as we might expect, it is an uneasy balance.

The story is delivered to us partly through our protagonist Adaric’s recollections and council proceedings to investigate all that went wrong during a particularly chaotic culling—a rite for entry into the ranks of a vampire house. We get a good glimpse into the complex political machinations among vampire houses. As you might expect, bloodlust goes hand in hand with deception and backstabbing.

I was surprised by the amount of lore packed into this tiny book. While I am seldom one to complain about fast-paced adventures, in this case I felt it would have benefited from being at least a bit longer. For one, I would have wanted to be part of the proceedings for the selection of the next head of the House of Boars, which was completely skipped over. But beyond that, this is a world where I would want to spend more time in, see it from the PoV of a character rising through the ranks, and see them navigate through the politics and violence.

But all in all, the little time I did get to spend with the strigoi, I thoroughly enjoyed. I hope Jack decides to write longer works set in this world.

Absolutely loved the recurring motto:

He who strikes too soon dies, he who waits too long kneels.