Dracula: The Original 1897 Edition (A Bram Stoker Classic Novel) Paperback – 1 Feb. 2023

If you only reaed one Vampire story read this one.If you only read one horror story read this one.If you only read one book - well, that would be going a bit far.I've owned the Penguin Classics edition for years and have just bought the Kindle version which I've not downloaded yet so this is a review of the novel itself in whatever format.This is quite simply one of the best books I've ever read and by far the best horror story.It's an epistolary (as in epistle) novel which means it's made up of letters, notes, and journal entries written by the characters themselves. Because of that the author keeps himself out of it altogether. You don't feel like you're being told a story as much as piecing it together for yourself. Someone has arranged all the documents in order for you and left you to get on with it. This pulls you right into the heart of it. You're with every character intimately (always 'I' not 'he' or 'she') as events unfold around them, as things happen to them, and as they watch things happen to those they love. And what happens is horrible, appalling, revolting, terrifying.Don't think Victorian novels are difficult. This is an absolute page-turner, unputdownable. It never drags, not for a moment. The sense of uncertainty, of fear, of not knowing what is happening, and then the sense of horror and dread and terror when they finally understand soaks out of every page. The tension builds relentlessly and never lets up. At times it's excruciating.And this is a horror story. There are passages in here which will make your blood run cold. Dracula is no comedy villain: he is revolting, but at the same time he's sexually potent and irresistible. (As are the female vampires.) Imagine being helplessly drawn to something which disgusts you in ever fibre of your being. There is a definite sexual conflict between Dracula and the men who find themselves struggling to protect their women from him which adds another layer of tension and depth to events. Being a Victorian novel that element is not spread graphically across the pages with its legs open; it's more subtle than that, mostly between the lines or in metaphor, for instance with the Texan impotently waving his enormous knife around.Perhaps the most remarkable thing about 'Dracula' is that Dracula isn't in it much. But then he doesn't need to be. You can feel his presence all the way through. He's out there. Somewhere. Unless he's already in here.Leave the lights on.

I attempted to read this book when I was about twelve, as I was just becoming interested in ghosts and vampires but, I found it a bit hard going and gave up pretty quickly.I have returned to it, some thirty years later, having seen and read many vampire films and books over the years. There have been many versions of the Dracula story but, of course, This is the Original.At first it takes a little while to get used to the use of language but, we must remember that this was written over a hundred years ago in a time when people, in polite society, probably spoke this way. Once I got my head around the style, I was able to read it easy and enjoy the suspense.By today's standards, in a world where we are desensitised to horror stories, this book will probably be tame. However, I found it still full of suspense and can imagine that back when it was something new, it would have been an even more tense read indeed.I enjoyed the way we get to read the story through the diaries and letters of the characters. We get to know how they all think individually and how they all are perceived by each other.After the first half of the book, or so, the story does slow a little but, I persevered and it picked up again in the final quarter.This is not the best book I have ever read but, I am glad I did, because this is where it all started. You can see what ideas of a Vampire have been carried on into books and films that other people have developed and make the connections. Also, considering how long ago it was written and the language used, I think, it still stand it's ground against the great horror writings of modern day.

Dracula, one of the best and most influential books I have ever read!Quite a statement that, so let’s look at it in a little more detail.The book is written as a series of diary and journal entries in the first person, and from several different perspectives. The characters are both male and female, one being a solicitor, one, a Doctor who runs a lunatic Asylum, and then there's Dr Val Helsing from Amsterdam.Mina Murray and Lucy Westenra's diary entries, add both intrigue and passion, we have the somewhat delicious English language, (as it was in late Victorian England), a love quadrangle, rather than a love triangle, desperation, sadness and remorse, but above all, we have Count Dracula.We all know the story of course, or do we?I first read this book over twenty years ago and in that time I'd forgotten most it, remembering just the bare bones.I had a vague recollection of Renfield and the asylum, the predicament in which Johnathan Harker found himself in, in the depth of the unforgiving Carpathian mountains, but I'd forgotten the pace of the book, the shear depth of fear the poor souls experienced, as they battled their way to Carfax Abbey, and then across Europe, to confront what must be, one of literature's most revered villains.And let us not forget one of the all-time best chapters in literary history, chapter 7, where the description of the storm and the landing of the Demeter, (Dracula's ship), at Whitby Harbour, is told as a news article in a local newspaper.Reading this book again, got me thinking about how many stories, films, television programs, cartoons, and comics there must be out there, that have been influenced by this book? Hundred, thousands maybe, who knows! From the obvious like, Salam's Lot and the Twilight saga, through Richard Matheson's sublime, I am Legend, to Justin Cronin's less obvious but equally exquisite, The Passage, to count (pun intended) but a few. (My own short story, Lycanthrope, would never have materialised without this book).So, a solid five stars for Bram Stoker's Dracula then, and what a better time to start reading it, than on All Hallows’ Eve.Enjoy my fiendish friend, read deep.