Bram Stoker Award Best Novel Winner
The Traveling Vampire Show
by Richard Laymon
Summary
On a scorching summer day in 1963, three teenagers in a small American town scheme to sneak into a forbidden touring sideshow that promises a captured living vampire for one night only. Their day spirals through escalating danger and violence as they make their way toward the show's midnight performance. Laymon delivers a fast, visceral coming of age horror story shaped by adolescent obsession, fear, and dread of what the carnival truly holds.
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Historical Context & Significance
Richard Laymon died in 2001, and the novel won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel shortly after his death.