Type of bind: Hardcover
Format: Bargain Price
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 320
Printing Date: August 25, 2005
Sale Popularity Level: 750327
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Product Description:
One year ago, Cal Thompson was a college freshman more interested in meeting girls and partying in New York City than in attending his biology classes. Now, after a fateful encounter with a mysterious woman named Morgan, biology has become, literally, Cal’s life.
Cal was infected by a parasite that has a truly horrifying effect on its host. Cal himself is a carrier, unchanged by the parasite, but he’s infected the girlfriends he’s had since Morgan—and all have turned into the ravening ghouls Cal calls peeps. The rest of us know them as vampires. And it’s Cal’s job to hunt them down before they can create even more of their kind. . . .
Bursting with the sharp intelligence and sly humour that are fast becoming his trademark, Scott Westerfeld’s new novel is an utterly original take on an archetype of horror.
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Rated by buyers 
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Cal's life hasn't been much fun since a one night stand turned him into a carrier for the parasite-spread disease better known as Vampirism. The night vision and amazing strength don't really make up for having to track down and capture every girl he's so much as kissed since then, since his exes are Parasite-positives - 'Peeps' for short - and have a habit of being mindless cannibals. Being a sexual vector for the apocalypse sucks. But as Cal gets closer to finding the girl who infected him, he discovers that the parasite may be more then a disease - and that he's involved in a plot older then civilization.
Peeps is possibly my favorite of the many YA vampire books out there, both for it's focus on evolutionary theory and the explicit (rather then the more usual metaphorical) treatment of Vampirism as an especially inconvenient STD. And the plot isn't bad either. Some of the best and most disturbing parts of the book are its chapters about the strange and somehow fascinating world of parasites. I don't think I'll ever feel quite as secure about humans' place on top of the evolutionary chain.
Rated by buyers -
So a girl at my work recommended I read Scott Westerfeld books. We work in a bookstore and apparently nobody else that we worked with had ever read any of them and she wanted to talk with somebody that had read them. Lets just say, WOW! I didn't realize that teen lit could be good! I really liked this book. I don't normally like books about vampires, but this book was more about vampirism as a parasite. And at the end the book made it seem like it was a necessary parasite, which sent chills down my spine. I would have given this book 5 stars except for some of the vocabulary. It was absolutely ridiculous how many times the author used the word 'anathema' in the book. Nobody uses that word, especially a teenager, but if I hear a ton of teens using that word, I will know why. It is almost like he kept using that word to make the teens feel like they were reading a 'grown up' book, when 'grown up' books don't even use that word. I just took the book less and less seriously every time that word was used, which was probably a hundred or more times.
Rated by buyers -
I really loved the idea that being a vampire was like catching a disease, and it was also very zombie-like. I thought the inner chapters of other species of parasites was intruging and disgusting, and made me really look at stuff differently after that!
My only disappointment was the end, well sort of. The way the parasite was transferred seemed silly and cheesy to me, and I found myself laughing, and not in a good way. Other than that though this was pretty good!
Rated by buyers -
Scott Westerfield delivers a wonderfully different take on Vampires (or Peeps for this book). His are caused by a parasite (oh the things you will learn about them in this book, you'll either enjoy the information or skip the even numbered chapters), and are oddly believable and quite fun.
The plot was enjoyable, but still suffers from Westerfield's inability to write action scenes tat you can follow without having to re-read sentences. His Peeps where interesting and fun, up till the end when they got confusing, he obviously intended for this to be a big reveal, and it came off very head-scratchy. I think I would have preferred just a little more explanation for this book, instead of saving it for the next.
As others have said, Cal's forced celibacy should have been more present and enforced. After all he is a teenage boy (albeit a very mature one), and I didn't find it completely believable how little he thought about sex.
I think this book is a great teen read for anyone ages 14 and above, who is looking for either a new take on vampires or is big on the biology and fantasy.
Rated by buyers -
When I picked up this book I didn't know what to think of it. As I've recently discovered the vampire genre and fantasy related books (Stephanie Meyers "Twilight" and Kelly Armstrong's "Bitten" are some fine examples) I was eager for more of the same quality and stumbled upon "Peeps."
What's great about this book is that the vampires in question are not at all what you expect them to be. The explanation offered is original and sounds plausible. Seriously, vampire obsessed teenagers might even start considering this as their bible: proof that vampires do exist! (Stranger things have happened; "Elvis is Alive" or "Bruce Lee is actually meditating in a cave" anyone?)
The book is narrated by Cal, a sarcastic, fresh and little geeky 19 year old boy. If you're failing Biology, get this book and you'll be armed with a whole arsenal of facts about things you never really wanted to know. But your teacher will be impressed, trust me.
I'm not going to draw out the storyline for you; others have done that already. Besides, it kind of ruines the experience. This is the kind of book you should buy blindly. Do it at one of those moments where your wallet is burning in your jeans. But this time, instead of bashing your head against a wall, you'll be thinking "man, I should do that more often!"
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