Wednesday 31 October 2018

Dracul

Happy Halloween everyone! It’s Heather again - I don’t normally post twice in one month but given that this novel deals with vampires, cockroaches and all that lovely stuff I thought it made more sense to post today. Many thanks to the authors for sending me a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Information

Author: Dacre Stoker and J.D. Barker
Published: October 2018
Publisher: Bantam Press
Length: 512 pages

Brief Description (from Amazon)

It is 1868, and a 22-year-old Bram Stoker has locked himself inside an abbey's tower to face off against a vile and ungodly beast. He is armed with mirrors and crucifixes and holy water and a gun - and is kept company by a bottle of plum brandy. His fervent prayer is that he will survive this one night - a night that will prove to be the longest of his life. Desperate to leave a record of what he has witnessed, the young man scribbles out the events that brought him to this point - and tells an extraordinary tale of childhood illness, a mysterious nanny, and stories once thought to be fables now proven true.
A riveting, heart-stoppingly scary novel of Gothic suspense, Dracul reveals not only the true origins of Dracula himself, but also of his creator, Bram Stoker . . . and of the elusive, enigmatic woman who connects them.
Review

Wow. I absolutely loved this novel. When I heard that J.D. Barker and Dacre Stoker (Bram Stoker’s great grand-nephew) were collaborating to write a prequel to Dracula I was absolutely delighted. I’m still recovering from the epic ending of Barker’s Fourth Killer Monkey – who would have guessed that that guy was the murderer?! – so knew they would inject the perfect amount of suspense and unpredictable plot twists. And, like the typical English Literature student I am, I adore Dracula. Ironically, I’ve just written an essay on it so if anyone asks then getting my excuse for staying up all night finishing Dracul is that I’m a dedicated student who wanted to do some further reading. Jokes aside I genuinely did find this a very informative read. The novel blends fiction and fact together so many of the details about Bram were accurate, for instance, it's true that he spent a lot of his childhood bedridden from an unknown illness. 

It’s very easy for writers to fall into the trap of thinking ‘vampire = inhumane monster = evil’ and I was really impressed that Barker and Stoker avoided this. Nanny Ellen’s morally ambiguous traits made her character much more interesting to read about. The same thing goes for any type of character really, whilst it’s fine to have the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ side, the crossover characters add another dimension to a novel. There’s a pretty big split in the Harry Potter fandom between the people who think Snape is a hero and those who believe he’s detestable (I’m on side detestable, there’s no excuse for bullying Neville). Do we have this argument about Voldemort or Bellatrix? Nope. Of course, it’s fantastic to have that absolutely horrible villain, in this case Dracul, and the very likable Bram and Matilda, throwing Nanny Ellen into the mix makes everything more sinister as the reader doesn’t know who to trust. Thornley, whilst definitely on team good, had some phenomenal character development as well as he went from a somewhat distant and suspicious sibling to someone fully committed to hunting down Dracul. 

As a prequel, the novel definitely succeeds in answering some of the more confusing parts of Dracula. The abilities of the vampire, for instance, are addressed with confidence so the reader can fully understand exactly what and how vampires operate. I liked how Stoker and Barker mimicked Dracula’s creative epistolary form in their prequel with the diary entries, though I felt this could have been developed better. In Dracula there is definite acknowledgement of the form with Mina notably compiling all their accounts together and the highly amusing little notes (‘Mem., get recipe for Mina’, ‘this diary seems horribly like the beginning of the “Arabian Nights”’). There’s a bit of this in Dracul but I feel like it could have been used more. Nonetheless, the writing style itself is excellent, packed full of beautifully worded imagery and quirky lines of dialogue. 

Is Dracul actually scary? Well I decided to read this while home-alone and I thought that the mysterious eerie noises coming from our fridge and the missing television remote meant our house was haunted. I don’t know why I thought any monster would steal a television remote and not the TV itself but I think this pretty much reflects how terrified I was. The funny thing is that there’s not much actual gore in the novel. It’s not as though every page is filled with the torments of a poor soul being slaughtered in vivid and disturbing manner. In a way I think this is what frightened me. This coupled with the factual details about Bram Stoker means the realism is heightened massively. The story is convincing yet still undeniably spooky and gripping.

Get nice and comfortable in your coffin because I found myself completely engrossed in this riveting read. Needless to say, I really recommend picking up a copy of Dracul (it’s Halloween, treat yourselves!), particularly if you’re a fan of Dracula.

2 comments:

  1. Great review! As a fellow (former) English student and lover of Dracula, I'll have to give this one a read!

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    1. Thank you, hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did! - Heather

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