Welcome to our fifth year of reading Anne Rice books for Halloween, with special guest Dr. Claire Mischker! He's David Talbot, nobody's favorite old man/young twink vampire! She's Merrick, too cool for these dusty losers, out here committing perfume crimes! In accordance with long-established tradition, this episode is rambling and yelly and has weird sound! Note: I promise we actually do know that Guatemala is in Central America, but once you make a mistake one time on a podcast it's really hard to not keep making it.

As usual there are a slew of real content warnings about anything our girl Anne writes - in this one there is some really gross sexualization of a child (although she is an adult when they actually bang it out); there's somebody letting Anne Rice write about race and colorism which was, let's say, a mistake; and there's quite a lot of talk about suicide. If you need support, the new 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is available by phone (just dial 988) or by text or chat at https://988lifeline.org/. You are not a fictional vampire; we are glad you are here and want you to stay here.