Suckers

The thing that bit musician Danny Ferry on the back of the neck late one night after a gig in North Carolina looked like a bat, but the bite’s effects are first strange, then scary, then terrifying. In Rider’s shining crowdfunded debut, Danny becomes one of the first victims of a mysterious parasitic creature that turns people into “Suckers”: zombie-like vampires who will stop at nothing to get a fix of blood. Worse, some of those victims become living breeding grounds for more parasites. With the help of a bandmate, Danny finds a way to mitigate the effects of the blood lust; others are not so lucky. The story’s slow build perfectly mirrors the development of Danny’s unpleasant condition. Mixing recent apocalyptic and zombie stories with classic vampire legends, Rider has come up with a daring and eminently readable new take on both. (Feb.)