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Item - Vampire Express

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(Original edition)
(Book club edition)
(Revised cover edition)

Combined Summary

Series: Choose Your Own Adventure (1979-1998) — no. 31
Translated Into: Banpiroen espresoa (Basque)
Dorakyura Tokkyu [ドラキュラ特急] (Japanese)
L'exprés dels vampirs (Catalan)
El expreso de los vampiros (Spanish)
El expreso de los vampiros (Spanish)
O expresso dos vampiros (Portuguese)
V poyezde s vampirami [В поезде с вампирами] (Russian)
Vampire express (French)
Vampiro express (Italian)
Vampyr-ekspressen (Danish)
Vampyyrien maa (Finnish)
Author: Koltz, Tony
Illustrators: Jamieson, Doug (interior)
Mattingly, David B. (Revised cover edition - cover)
Date: April, 1984 (Original edition)
ISBNs: 055316497X / 9780553164978 (Book club edition)
0553240994 / 9780553240993 (Original edition)
0553270532 / 9780553270532 (Revised cover edition)
Length: 118 pages
Number of Endings: 21
User Summary: You travel to the vampire-infested Carpathian Mountains of Romania to help your uncle Andrew prove scientifically that the undead actually exist.
auximenes's Thoughts:

I clearly remember the day I bought Vampire Express at the grade school book fair. I was fascinated by all things vampire at the time and would buy any book that featured them. There were also quite a few quality, classic vampire films from the 80s, such as Fright Night and The Lost Boys. And who could resist a classic Hammer Films epic with Christopher Lee?

Vampire Express has a good mix of traditional vampire lore and original concepts. Zoltan and Carmilla are worthy villains, and the Bloodstone and portrait are the the powerful objects needed to defeat them.

The train setting is marvelous, just like any good James Bond film, or Agatha Christie murder mystery. There are many great characters to meet throughout your adventure: a flamboyant magician, a skeptical professor, vampire hunter Uncle Andrew, and Nina’s aunt Mrs. West. Gruesome settings and deaths abound. I was particularly traumatized by the spiders.

At one point the Blue pill / Red pill choice of the matrix is foreshadowed when the Romani wise woman offers you a crimson stone or emerald stone depending on whether you want to take a safe path or a dangerous path.

The artwork is delightfully creepy throughout the book. One of my favorites, this book gets 5 of 5 stars.

More reviews by auximenes

Demian's Thoughts:

While this book isn't spectacularly original, it has decent writing and well-designed paths. Some things to watch out for are the magical painting (which is quite bizarre) and the various character names lifted from classic vampire fiction.

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Good's Thoughts:

Sorry. Not interested.

More reviews by Good

knifebat's Thoughts:

I was really looking forward to this one. I went looking for this at half price books and found Crypt of the Vampire instead, I really enjoyed that one so I ordered this in February, 2011. I prefer when they have numbered paragraphs over the ones that say turn to this page. This one goes by page. I also wasn't too happy with the many dialogs included between the characters. "Don't be so certain my dear," says Mrs. West. This kind of thing is all over the book. Other than that I thought it was really well written, but a bit too kiddy for me. Crypt of the Vampire feels a bit more for an older audience and I liked that aspect. Being on a spooky train going through the Carpathian mountains with bad vampires lurking in the corner is interesting to me. If you like lots of characters to team up with, this book has it. I really liked the magical necklace, but the magical painting was a disappointment. If they took it out of the frame and slapped it on a special shield that would have been much better. There's a few creative wild endings that you don't want to miss, such as: Your room and the beach. I liked that there are two vampires, Count Zoltan and Countess Carmilla.

More reviews by knifebat

Errata:

The first printing of the book has the following errors:

page 34 - should go to page 17
page 61 - should go to page 87
page 63 - should go to page 80
page 82 - choice one should go to page 16
page 91 - choice page numbers are reversed: choice one should go to page 6, choice two should go to page 50
page 103 - choice two should go to page 81

These errors were not all fixed at once -- some later printings still contain some errors while fixing others. Eventually, all problems were solved, and there are copies of the book out there with no problems.

Special Thanks:Thanks to knginatl for the errata.
Users Who Own This Item: AgathaRaisin79, aline, Andys80s, Ardennes (original & reissue), auximenes, barryattles, benji2, bigcobra, bobthefunny (HC), Chanticrow, Countersound, Crazyscotsman, Darth Rabbitt, dave2002a, Dirk Omnivore, drereichdude (original ), duckhugger, Eamonn McCusker, Ed, Erikwinslow (Revised), firefoxpdm, Fireguard, fraze, fushek, Game Master, Garrick Muttley, girtablilu, Gurvo, hadlee73, Himynameistony, hoops4ever, horrorbusiness, jeff3333, jharvey79, JoshW, katzcollection, KenJenningsJeopardy74, killagarilla, kinderstef, KJB, knginatl (orig., "book club", "book fair", reissue, perma-bound, French), knifebat (Been a fan of vampires since pre-K), le maudit, MacbthPSW, Madeye, Malthus Dire, marcfonline, marnaudo, mlvoss, Mr ?, nelsondesign, NEMO (book club edition and reissue), nicolau (Spanish ed. Timun Mas), Nomad, ntar (original & reissue), Oberonbombadil (Original UK 1st (my childhood copy)), outspaced, Pessimeister, pinkfloydechoes, plowboy, Pseudo_Intellectual, Radical347, Ronie1976, rtaylor352, Ryuran333, Seizure, spragmatic, strawberry_brite, SuperAM2, ThaRid, ThisIslandEarth, toadhjo, Von Scotty, waktool (US 1st; US 4th; US 6th), Yalius, YourSoundtrack, zat
Users Who Want This Item: aline, b4x (permabound edition ), bookwormjeff, Count Heydrich, Cyan, exaquint (1.95, book club, book fair, reissue), Ffghtermedic, Gartax, HAMBORSKI (I would like to purchase a copy of this book.), kleme, Lambchop, MasterChief, nordik (Vampire Express), Nym90, odo_ital, SherlockHolmes, stock, The Mystery Squad fan, Waluigi Freak 99, yunakitty
Users with Extra Copies: bigcobra
kinderstef - x 4 (3 x classic, 1 reissue)
ntar - reissue
ThisIslandEarth
Yalius

Known Editions

Original edition
Book club edition
Revised cover edition

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