The Night Eternal

Did You Know?

• Writer David Lapham and artist Mike Huddleston adapted the novel into an 11-issue story arc for the eponymous comic-book series from Dark Horse Comics.
• Executive producer and showrunner Carlton Cuse adapted the novel into the 10-episode third and fourth season of the eponymous television series from FX.

Plot

Two years after the vampires detonated atomic bombs to trigger a nuclear winter, the sun shines for only a few hours each day, letting them roam freely the rest of the time. They have turned society into a police state, killing off the most powerful humans, making slaves of the rest, and sending the weak to camps where their blood is harvested. A handful of survivors keep fighting back. Epidemiologist Dr. Ephraim Goodweather is pulling away from his friends. The Master, who now lives inside the body of rock star Gabriel Bolivar, has taken Goodweather’s son Zach under his wing and is preparing the boy to become his next vessel. Goodweather’s partner, Dr. Nora Martinez, has left him for exterminator Vasiliy Fet. After Abraham Setrakian’s death, Fet is trying to make sense of the Occido Lumen, a book that holds the secret to destroying the Master. He gets help from Mr. Quinlan, a half-vampire seeking revenge, created when the Master infected his pregnant human mother. Scenes from biblical times show how the vampire race began. The seven Ancients, including the Master, came from Ozryel, the archangel of death. God sent Ozryel and two other angels to wipe out Sodom and Gomorrah for their sins. While destroying those cities, Ozryel was consumed by bloodlust—he had never seen blood before during his other cleansing missions. He then turned on Michael, attacking him to drink his blood. Horrified, God had the other archangels cut Ozryel into seven pieces and scatter them across the world. Over time, blood seeped from the burial sites and became conscious, giving rise to the Ancient Ones. The Master was the last to emerge, born from Ozryel’s throat.

Reception

Stephen King wrote that the main attraction is the resistance fighters' dedication, and that heroes of tragic dimension are rare in popular fiction, with Goodweather filling the void perfectly. He noted the action is non-stop and the fantasy element is anchored in satisfying detail. The San Francisco Chronicle's Alan Cheuse described the novel's style as a weird, loose montage of fear-making moments with multiple viewpoints constantly shifting and re-forming the story.