Dracula by Bram Stoker

Today's review will be about:

THE SUMMARY

Beware The Deadly Count Dracula
Jonathan Harker is travelling to Castle Dracula to see the Transylanian noble Count Dracula. He is begged by locals not to go there, because of the eve of St George's Day, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will come full sway. But business must be done, so Jonathan makes his way to the castle - and then his nightmare begins. His beloved wife, Mina, and other lost souls have fallen under the Count's horrifying spell. Dracula must be destroyed...

MY REVIEW

For the longest time, I have been obsessed with reading books that feature vampires. Although it had always been a dream of mine to read the book that has since inspired many others, I had never given it much thought other than it was something that I would get to someday. Thankfully, I took a class that had this book as a required reading, so I was able to achieve one of my dreams earlier than I thought. I'm very glad that I did.

"I bid you welcome."

This book is separated by the journal entries of the main characters; Johnathan Harker, Mina Murray, Lucy Westenra, Dr. Seward, and Dr. Van Helsing, along with newspaper clippings and other logs that give us a full view of what is happening in the world surrounding Dracula.

Nosferatu

However, we don't get a log entry from any of the vampires in the book, including Dracula himself.  This doesn't diminish the book in any way, however, because instead of getting the personal account of Dracula or his wives, we get to see them, interact with them, see the carnage that they leave in their wake, but we never truly understand them at the deepest level. We get plenty of information on what he or his wives do, but we never get why any of those things are done. This covers these characters in a shroud of mystery so that you can never really know what drives them to do the things that they do and say the things that they say.
Despite the old language that the book was written  in, I found myself reading a lot of it durng my free time, wanting to know what Dracula was going to do next and what the rest of the main characters were going to do about it. Like a Shakespearean play, after a while you get so used to the language that they use in the journal entries that you hardly notice how different it is.

Van Helsing "fighting" Dracula with sunlight

One of the things that threw me off at first was the fact that Van Helsing wasn't the young Hugh Jackman-like monster hunter that I had been used to. Instead, he was more of the wise advisor. I did like him as the Gandalf of the group after a while though, being able to research the creature that they were dealing with and how to kill it was very useful.

Dracula dancing with Anna (Van Helsing)

Instead, the role of hero was passed along to what I think is the story's main protagonist; Johnathan Harker. He is pulled into this entire mess when he is hired by the Count to help him find a suitable house in England for the Count to settle into as a second home. Johnathan is faced with a danger that he wasn't expecting, and so he decides to write home to his fiancée, Mina, but the Count is blocking his every move to escape. During his time in castle Dracula, we get a pretty good description of the Count's home, his abilities, and most of all his strange habits. But once again, this only gives us a glimpse of who he actually is, the rest is shrouded in mystery. Many times Van Helsing and their other companions praise Johnathan for his bravery in coming back to fight the thing that he ran away from at castle Dracula, and I often found myself cheering him on.

Renfield and Dracula (Dracula: Dead and Loving It)

Something that was super interesting about the book was Dr. Seward's tortured patient: Renfield. Apparently, he used to be a servant to Dracula, a service that drove him absolutely insane. During one part of the book, he is obsessing about  cats and how much he wants one, and then he starts a never-ending collection of bugs that he traps and then feeds to their predators. I haven't read a lot of books that include the mentally insane (maybe that should change), so the fact that a book as old as this one when they probably didn't talk about such things in "civilized" culture, is pretty cool.

"If ever a look meant death - if looks could kill - we saw it at that moment." -Dracula, Chapter XVI

There is so much more that I could talk about concerning this book, but I afraid that if I do this will start to look and sound like an essay, which is not what I want this to be. This book met all of my expectations as a wonderful depiction of the vampire myth, and it is very deserving to have lasted so long, well-loved by many. So go ahead, go grab it from a nearby shelf and devour its pages and the story that lies in wait inside.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Born in Dublin, Ireland, on November 8, 1847, Bram Stoker published his first literary work, The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland, a handbook in legal administration, in 1879. Turning to fiction later in life, Stoker published his masterpiece, Dracula, in 1897. Deemed a classic horror novel not long after its release, Dracula has continued to garner acclaim for more than a century, inspiring the creation of hundreds of film, theatrical and literary adaptations. In addition to Dracula, Stoker published more than a dozen novels before his death in 1912.
(Read more about Bram Stoker)

A LITTLE EXCERPT

"I only slept a few hours when I went to bed, and feeling that I could not sleep any more, got up. I had hung my shaving-glass by the window, and was just beginning to shave. Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder, and heard the Count's voice saying to me, 'Good morning.' I started, for it amazed me that I had not seen him, since the reflection of the glass covered the whole room behind me. In starting I had cut myself slightly, but did not notice it at the moment. Having answered the Count's salutation, I turned to the glass again to see how I had been mistaken. This time there could be no error, for the man was close to me, and I could see him over my shoulder. But there was no reflection of him in the mirror! The whole room behind me was displayed; but there was no sign of a man in it, except myself. This was startling, and, coming on the top of so many strange things, was beginning to increase that vague feeling of uneasiness which I always have when the Count is near; but in that instant I saw that the cut had bled a little, and the blood was trickling over my chin. I laid down the razor, turning as I did so half-round to look for some sticking-plaster. When the Count saw my face, his eyes blazed with a sort of demonaic fury, and he suddenly made a grab at my throat. I drew away, and his had touched the string of beads which held the crucifix. It made an instant change in him, for the fury passed so quickly that I could hardly believe that it was ever there."

pages 40-41

(In a bad Transylvanian accent)
Vell, that's all for now.

'Til we meet again.

~Sea-Solo

EXTRA! EXTRA!

Here are some clips of my favorite depictions of Dracula!:

Dracula Untold (2014)

Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995)

Van Helsing (2004)

Hotel Transylvania (2012)

Supernatural S4E5 (2008)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer S5E1 (2000)

Twilight Sucks by Barely Political

Peaceweaver by Rebecca Barnhouse

Today's review will be about:

THE SUMMARY

Sixteen-year-old Hild has always been a favorite of her uncle, the king of the Shylfings. So when she protects her cousin the crown prince from a murderous traitor, she expects the king to be grateful. Instead, she is unjustly accused of treachery herself.
As punishment, her uncle sends Hild far away to the heir of the enemy king, Beowulf, to try to weave peace between the two kingdoms. She must leave her home and everyone she loves. On the long and perilous journey, Hild soon discovers that fatigue and rough terrain are the least of her worries. Something is following her and her small group of guards - some kind of foul creature that tales say lurks in the fens. Will Hild have to face the monster? Or does it offer her the perfect chance to escape the destiny she never chose?

MY REVIEW

If you were looking at the cover of this book and thinking: "This book looks like fun", well then you would be absolutely right! Believe me when I say that the cover isn't the most exciting thing about this book, but rather it is the extremely believable story that lives within it!
When reading, you form theories on how the book is going to end, and one by one they are all disproved until you get to the end, and even then nothing is for sure. That is one of the things that I loved about this book, it keeps you guessing until the very end, and then you have to somehow suck yourself out of the story so that you can go on to other books.
The cover is what really drew me in at first, and I'm happy to say that this IS a book that you can judge from the cover. The cover art depicts very realistically the horror that you encounter later in the book, a fight between Hilde and whatever that is, so take comfort in the fact that it won't catch you completely by surprise (even though it will surprise you still).
Hild's blackouts are intense and unpredictable and make you wonder what in the heck is going on, which makes it really fun to read. Still, this book is very violent, so we (my class) were thinking that this would be appropriate for ages 12+.
Another thing that is wonderful about this book is the fact that it looks at the sort of aftershock after King Beowulf (yeah, that's right, THAT guy) died while defeating the dragon. Even if you haven't seen or read Beowulf, the story is explained very well, so you don't have to force yourself to read it if you don't want to (though I would recommend it, just so that you have read it and have said bragging rights). The tie-in with another Medievalist novel was a good move and really sets you into the time-frame.
With all of that comes another plus: Norse mythology. Once again, if you don't know anything about Norse mythology, don't sweat it, because that is explained as well, and although it is a major part of the book, you don't need to know much to dive-in, feet first. (Pretty much if you watched Thor or Thor: The Dark World, you'll be fine.)
And the rest? Well, you'll just have to read it for yourself, won't you? ;)

A LITTLE EXCERPT

Within Hild, something snapped. White-hot fury filled her, and without realizing what she was doing, she grabbed her skirt in one hand, her sword in the other, and ran blindly toward her cousin. In less time than it takes a hawk to plummet from the sky after its prey, she was across the practice area, shouldering Arinbjörn aside and pushing with her sword. Her arm jolted as the weapon met resistance, but she shoved back against something she couldn't see, then shoved again, pushing her blade in front of her as it buried itself in something solid.
Everything stopped. Insects in the grass quit their chirring mid-note, the breeze in the birches held its breath, the bright autumn sky blanked into white -
-and then a weight was on her sword as the man standing in front of Arinbjörn staggered.
Now her own lips were parted and she stepped back, taking her blood-spattered hand from the sword, which was still embedded in the man's guts, and looked over his shoulder at Arinbjörn. A tuft of her cousin's hair was sticking up on one side, she noted incongruously. It gave him a comical appearance.
A raven cawed, unlocking the stillness, shocking the world back to life.

(pages 56-57)

Well, that's all for now!

See you next time!

~Sea-Solo

EXTRA! EXTRA!

Visit Rebecca Barnhouse's website!:
http://www.rebeccabarnhouse.com/index.html

Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Janet Gray

Today's review will be about:

THE SUMMARY

"A road's a kind of holy thing...
it brings all kinds of people and
all parts of England together."
Eleven-year-old Adam loved to travel throughout thirteenth-century England with his father, a wandering minstrel, and his dog, Nick. But when Nick is stolen and his father disappears, Adam suddenly finds himself alone. He searches the same roads he traveled with his father, meeting farmers, pilgrims, minstrels, priests, and thieves along the way. Through these encounters, Adam discovers that somewhere in the crowds of people are his father and his dog. But will Adam be able to find them and end his desperate search?

MY REVIEW

I was assigned this book for my Medieval Lit class, and loved it so much that I had to share it with you guys!
The adventures that you go on with Adam are fun and hold your mind until the last page. All the while, you are wondering if everything will turn out all right in the end. The music and minstrel's tales held the book together and really transported you back into the middle ages.
Adam is a very lovable character, with a big head sometimes, but is always out to make people happy, no matter what he himself is feeling at the time. As a reader, you watch him grow up, following him in his quest to find his dog and his father.
The most important thing that this book did for me was it reminded me of what it was like to be a kid. Many times in our lives we want something that we don't have; adulthood and childhood being one of the things we want throughout our long lives. We forget, however, about what it is to be a child, and this book brings us back. We feel the same sort of mystery and adventure as with any book, but rather than making us long for said adventure, it reminds us of the children we once were. And that, my friends, is the greatest gift of all. :)

A LITTLE EXCERPT

"Nick!" shouted Adam. "Nick!"
There he was. There was Nick in that boat, and every minute the strip of water between them was widening. "That's my dog!" he cried. "He took my dog!"
The people on the dock at once gathered around him with exclamations and questions.
"When the ferry comes back, dearie," said a pleasant-faced woman, "you can have my place and I'll wait for the next one."
When the ferry came back! By that time Jankin would be gone, and Nick with him. They were nearly to the other shore now.
Adam took his harp from his shoulder and his bundle; he unfastened his belt and wallet and took off his shoes, and piled them all together. "Watch them for me," he said to the friendly woman.
Then he dived.

Well, that's all for now!

See you in the next one!

~Sea-Solo

EXTRA! EXTRA!

Listen to Sumer is Icumen In, a medieval song mentioned in the book!