Look closely and you can see a big spider… Creepy!
I’m a little ashamed to admit that I’ve never read Dracula. I read Frankenstein, so at least I don’t have to be completely ashamed, but… how did I miss that?
I’m reading It Started with Dracula: The Count, My Mother & Me by Jane Congdon. It’s a memoir written by a woman who has always been a Dracula fan since she saw her first Dracula movie, starring Christopher Lee. She explains that she had always wanted to see Romania, but that it took her until her 60s to get there. Once in Romania, she started resolving some of her childhood issues.
She explains that she had read about travel being a transformative experience, but that she didn’t expect to actually experience any transformation or changes.
I’m not very far into the book, but so far, I’m really enjoying it. She talks about vampires, and I realized that it’s been a long time since I’ve read anything with a “real” vampire in it. I think the last one must have been ‘Salem’s Lot, by Stephen King.
Recent books with vampires have romanticized them, with books like Twilight, the Anita Blake books and The Vampire Diaries. Vampires just aren’t scary anymore. They’re sexy and rich, and can be tamed like puppies. What made Dracula so scary was that he was sexy and evil. He couldn’t be tamed. Vampires of yesterday treated humans like food or vermin.
Here’s a list of 55 best vampire books per Goodreads. I think my next mission is to work through this list. What’s the best vampire book you’ve ever read?
Doree Weller 