"Beware when the vampires come to town"
Dust Devils is a 2014 horror vampire novel by Jonathan Janz.
In the year 1885, Cody Wilson's wife had been murdered by a troupe of murderous actors after they tricked her into coming to them by offering her a role. Meanwhile, the young boy Willet Black saw his friends massacred by this same troupe of actors. Now, both Cody Wilson and Willet Black are seeking revenge on this fiendish group of actors in the New Mexico during the Wild West.
Both Cody and Willet learn that much darker problems await them on their hunt as these actors are actually vampires. This troupe of vampires is led by the horrifying and ancient Adam Price, who is wreaking havoc across the US. Now Cody and Willet must band together to defeat him and his horde or find themselves victims of his thirst.
Dust Devils provides examples of:
- Ancient Evil: The Big Bad Adam Price is noted to be an ancient monster who has walked the Earth for thousands of years, possibly even more, and has been feeding off of and terrorising humanity since then.
- Big Bad: The main antagonist of the novel is King Vampire Adam Price, who's wreaking havoc across the Old West and is being hunted by hero, Cody.
- Bittersweet Ending: Cody ends up losing his father and stepfather to the vampires and is forced to destroy his friend Willet, who has been turned into a vampire. That said, Cody does end up destroying the entire vampire gang and avenging their many victims, and he settles down with Marguerite and states they'll name their possible future son Jack in honour of Cody's father.
- Faux Affably Evil: Adam Price can be charming and polite and pretend to be a rather affable actor. That's just a front he puts on, as he's a deranged maniac who enjoys killing and mutilating.
- Femme Fatalons: In the book, vampires possess long fingers with razor sharp endings, which they use to cut into and disembowel their prey.
- Feral Vampires: Adam Price and his vampire gang are ravenous beasts who gleefully rip apart their victims and act like unhinged monsters.
- Forced to Watch: After Cody starts to mess with him, Adam Price decides out of spite that he's going to capture Cody's father and stepmother and mutilate and murder them in front of him.
- Fully-Embraced Fiend: Adam Price and his gang of vampires aren't even beholden to their thirst like the newly turned, but actively enjoy killing and feeding. They have long since given up their humanity in favour of enjoying killing others.
- Kick the Dog: The vampire gang love to go out their way to hurt people, with some of their worst deeds being murdering Cody's horse just to spite him and burning an old kindly woman alive for no reason.
- Mad Artist: Adam Price and his troupe of actors are vampires and mix their love of killing into some of their performances. Adam enthralls an entire town with his violent play, which quickly becomes real as he feasts upon them and turns on them as part of his show.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Vampires in this book can shift into a monstrous form with ghoulish white skin, long fingers and eerie, glowing orange eyes. Their bite turns others into vampires who possess a bloodlust upon turning. They feed off blood to regenerate wounds and hence can only be permanently destroyed by being decapitated. These vampires are affected by bluebell flowers, which when if ingested, are lethal to the vampires and cause them to turn to ashes.
- Papa Wolf: Jack Wilson goes out of his way to defend his son Cody when a group of vampire attack him.
- Spiked Blood: Cody defeats the vampire Dragomir by tricking him into drinking the blood of the Sheriff Bittner, Cody forced Bittner to eat bluebell flowers before he was fed upon by Dragomir, and bluebell flowers are toxic when consumed by vampires. This means that Dragomir ends up indirectly consuming the Bluebell flowers and dying as a result of them being poisonous.
- Staking the Loved One: Cody ends up having to destroy his friend and newly turned vampire Willet on Willet's urging to put him out of his misery. Cody later ends up destroying the body of his beloved father Jack to prevent him possibly rising up again as a vampire.
- Time Abyss: Vampire Adam Price is ancient, as he notes and is even noted to possibly being thousands of years old or even older.
- To Serve Man: The vampires in this book don't just consume blood, but also eat human flesh. In the novel, they are first seen roasting an old man on a spit and eating pieces of him.
- Transhuman Treachery: After becoming vampires, Martha Black and Angelica both turn away from their humanity almost immediately. Martha embraces the vampire side and even views the guy who slaughtered her family, Adam Price, as a sort of god.
- Undead Child: Willet Black is a twelve year old boy who ends up changed into a vampire. Willet is now an undead corpse with the ability to change into a bloodthirsty monster.
- Would Harm a Senior: The vampires go after even the defenseless elderly in the book, and we see them roast and eat an old man and burn a poor old woman alive out of spite.
- Would Hurt a Child: The vampires in the book have no problem with age when it comes to victims and gleefully murder children throughout the entire book.
