Angels from demons

From vamps and witches to angels, by way of Jesus. That unusual path maps Anne Rice’s fictional journey. The Vampire Chronicles author will publish Angel Time: Songs of the Seraphim (Knopf) on October 29. In Angel Time, the first in a series, a contract killer finds redemption after traveling through time to 13th-century England to save a Jewish community.

In blending her renewed religious beliefs with the supernatural themes that made her famous, Rice may have hit on a winning formula—Angel Time has already received a starred review from Booklist, and Kirkus calls it “devilishly clever.” What do we think? You’ll have to wait until October to find out, but here’s a hint: if the opening pages are any indication, the complicated killer for hire Toby O’Dare makes for a compelling lead character; his “guardian” angel Malchia is a powerful presence and the ending will leave readers wanting the next book.

Rice talked with BookPage interviewer Jay MacDonald about her change in course back when Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt was published. She said she’d never return to the “lost souls” who made her famous: “[O]nce I returned to the Church and began to see the universe as a place that really did incorporate redemption and really tried to understand the implications of there being a God, my identification with the vampires as outcasts, as outsiders and lost souls began to totally wane.”