208. Dracula

Dracula
Bram Stoker
1897
Around 400 pages

I am subverting expectations by posting this post-October, and it has nothing to do with my unwillingness to read and finish Quo Vadis in a timely manner.  Anyway, this is an old favorite of mine, and I wish epistolary novels were still popular, despite the whole "not making sense anymore" thing.

Do I need to give a plot description for this novel? If you don't know by now, you're staying ignorant on purpose, and it's obnoxious. But I'll indulge you just this once. Jonathan Harker is an English solicitor visiting Count Dracula in Transylvania about a real estate transaction.  Dracula really wants to move to England, because who doesn't, and Jonathan is stuck in a castle with a trio of vampiric hotties.

This novel has been dissected to AfterDeath, so I don't really have anything fresh to contribute. Some of the scholarly theories are really out there, my favorite being that Dracula is an indictment of Oscar Wilde. For me and most normies, it is just a thrilling story and a pleasure to read.

I love reading, but I'll admit, many classics are a slog to get through, especially if the author's name rhymes with Benry Hames. But this is pure fun and a great Thanksgiving read. So today, instead of talking to family members, ignore everybody and read Dracula. Claim you are looking for ideas.

RATING: *****

Interesting Facts:

Bram Stoker never enjoyed any financial success from the novel and died poor.  But Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote him a letter telling him how much he enjoyed it, which is better than dying happy and well-cared for.

UP NEXT: What Maisie Knew by Henry James. Henry James gets six novels on this List, which seems...excessive.