Dracula

This was the first horror novel I remember reading and it will forever hold a special place in my heart. What struck me first was the style of writing - Stoker was a very technologically advanced man, in step with the advancements of his generation, because the novel takes the somewhat splintered form of diary entries; journals and even phonographs! In this way we are given multiple points of view, none of which seem obtrusive or ill-conceived. In fact, in many ways these add to the uniqueness of the story and give us far more detail then a straight forward linear narrative. Some of these asides take a more rational view of proceedings -such as Dr Sewards phonographic recordings- others are far more emotive, such as poor Lucy's diary.

Everyone knows the story, and the myth of vampires has spread across the popular imagination and mindscapes of generations since the novel was first published. So is Dracula deserving of such a place in popular culture? I would say a resounding yes! The book is filled with a menace that slowly grows throughout the first half of the book where we're introduced to Redfern, and then the malevolent Count Dracula. At first the Count's demands are simply that of a lonely man, ill at ease with himself but then they become more sinister and one starts to imagine a fog-like evil pervading the pages.

These feelings continue to build ominously and the pace becomes unrelenting, the story tireless chances location from the Carpathian mountains to London, where a repressed society struggle to come to terms with the nature of true evil. This is heady stuff and Stoker pulls it off with such aplomb, page after masterful page - carried along in the tide of his imagination it becomes difficult to put the book down. Unlike other novels of its time, Dracula doesn't seem dated at all - it seems just as fresh as if it was written yesterday.