Dracula: The Un-Dead [Paperback]

A few years ago, the spoof metal band Bad News recorded a cover of Bohemian Rhapsody. The point of the joke was to be deliberately awful, and it reached a crescendo with a guitar solo so wincingly bad that it could only be the work of a genuis. And, surprise, surprise, the Bad News cover was overseen by none other than Queen's Brian May himself.

I mention it because I can't think of any other sensible explanation for this book - the Brian May in this case being not Bram Stoker, but his great grand-nephew, Dacre. Perhaps the Stoker literary genius is, like its creation, immortal, and lives on in the frame of his diluted bloodline. Unlikely, and it would only make sense if said inheritor were also possessed of an unusually well-developed sense of irony, and a mind to mock his more famous Irish ancestor the way Brian May once mocked his own guitar solo.

As I say, unlikely.

Mr Stoker has been co-opted by a "well-known Dracula Historian" called Ian Holt. I wonder if this is the same Ian Holt who scripted Dr Chopper, a 2005 straight-to-video release whose IMDB plot summary is: "Five young friends head out to the country for a weekend at the family cabin and run afoul of a group of motorcycle riding madwomen led by the sadistic, knife-wielding plastic surgeon Dr. Fielding."

Having read Dracula: The Undead, I have a sneaking suspicion it just might be the same Ian Holt.

Now if the sound of Dr. Chopper makes your heart sink, then look away now, for that is, at best, the level of wit and sophistication you will find in this novel. This is a toweringly awful book: a veritable tour de force of witless, guileless, inanity - so bad that, perversely, it is entertaining in manner of an Ed Wood movie; I found myself boxing on, propelled by the simple disbelief that anyone gormless enough to write this mush had the commercial acumen, tenacity and perseverance to bring it to market.

Despite the imprimatur of "Stoker family authorisation", in no sense does this novel even faintly resemble the fictional universe, style, world-view, sophistication, or literary outlook of Bram Stoker's Dracula. It is written without sympathy for that book or even the genre from which it comes, however hackneyed it may now be. I doubt that Dacre Stoker (hitherto a modern-day pentathlete, apparently) *really* contributed to this novel, and his great grand-uncle certainly didn't (the suggestion that this storyline was somehow crafted out of notes left by Bram Stoker is absurd), but even if he did, consider how interested you'd be in "MacBeth II" written by a distant relative of William Shakespeare.

As it happens, I had re-read Bram's Dracula a fortnight ago, so it was fresh in my mind. While it's a little flabby in places, in the main it is beautifully staged and elegantly written and manages its horror through unease: being epistolatory, the novel unfolds through contemporaneous records of protagonists who didn't know what is going on: there is therefore a creeping dread. The horror - and submerged sexuality - is almost all implied, and mostly metaphorical. Scarcely a drop of blood is shed in Bram Stoker's novel.

Would that any of this were true of this book. Fat chance. Lesbian sadomasochistic murder - I'm not kidding - commences on page 14, and after a hiatus of leaden plot exposition (and shameless revision) for the benefit of those who might have forgotten what happened in the original Dracula, this sequel settles into a lumpen, tepid bloodbath of gore, impalation, amputation, disembowelling, eye-put-outing, flesh-charring, and so on (quickly it becomes a blur) thereafter. I'm not being prudish here - there are certainly books which I've found so repellent I couldn't go on (Justine, for example), and this wasn't one of them - my objection is simply that this is poor literature: dull, monotonous and unimaginative, derivative and devoid of narrative interest or significant characterisation. It pales in comparison with the Gothic beauty and psychological horror of Stoker's original. While professing undying love and scholastic commitment, neither author seems to have the remotest conception of what is so good about Dracula.

It's also clumsily written and miserably sub-edited. Arch-villain Countess Bathory appears to be able to move instantly between London and Paris (and between Highgate and Hampstead cemeteries, though I think that may just be poor sub-editing) and at one point is given a superhero-like power of flight, which she uses to instantly fly from Paris to London, whereupon she boards a horse-drawn carriage and heads, in a hurry, for Whitby in Yorkshire (Whitby being just as far from London (as the vampire flies) as Paris)! When she gets there the great vamp-on-vamp showdown (!) is conducted via - and how I wish I were making this up - a sword fight. Honestly. And best not talk about the "Darth Vader" moment. Again, I'm really not kidding. Go on, you'll never guess.

I could go on. You sense the authors very definitely had a screenplay in mind, with plenty of CGI, wire work and Matrix-style visuals - a long-awaited big budget follow up to Dr. Chopper, perhaps. Heaven help us if that's the case - though you have to wonder whether it's not publisher's hype - or wishful thinking - to shift some copies of this horrid book.

If one of them shifts into your shopping trolley, don't say you weren't warned.

Olly Buxton

I had great hopes for this book as I love the original Dracula story. However, this book is a real let down. The plot is muddled, the characters feeble & unlikeable, & the writing & language poor & more in keeping with a detective novel. The strength of Bram Stoker's original story was in the gradual build up to the horror of Dracula & some of the descritions made the flesh creep. There was none of that in this novel ---- it was full on blood & guts, with a bit of lesbian sex thrown in! According to the authors, Dracula is a pretty good guy, and on the side of God (or vice versa). To anyone thinking of purchasing this book, my advice would be ---- don't!

This book is so frustrating. The first sequel licensed by the Stoker estate should be so much better than this, and somewhere is a decent story (which I shall go into with spoilers in a while).

Dracula isn't dead. Fine. That's the point of the book. There have been film sequels after sequels and we all know that vampires can be tricky to make sure they are finally dead. The main protagonist of this book however is Elizabeth Bathory, the notorious Hungarian Countess famed for bathing in the blood of local virgins. Presumably other virgins just wouldn't do.

Set 25 years after the events in Dracula she is hunting down the group of heroes (as they lazily become known and CONSTANTLY referred to as such by Holt - see Dan Brown and the Sacred Feminine for an example) who 'killed' Dracula. Now the treatment of said heroes is one of the most interesting aspects of the book. What happens after you have saved the world? What happens after your wife gets jiggy with a man who is 500 years older than you and has the experience to match?

Seward is a drug addled wreck, Holmwood is in denial and has developed a suicidal streak, Jonathan and Mina are together only for the sake of their son, and Van Helsing has become a pastiche of a Dutchman. Crazshy.

Holt seems caught between writing in Victorian and modern day language - both of which are stymied by his actual ability to write a story. Very much like a child, he writes in poor prose - akin to stories at school (and then we did this and then we went there). Simply the story doesn't flow. I don't blame Holt for this. He is a self-confessed Dracula-nerd, not an author. But to allow him this opportunity rather than someone who can actually write means he is out of his depth very, very quickly.

Taking Dracula as a context and mashing him as is the current trend with Vlad the Impaler, he seeks to transform this vampire into a modern romantic character, rather than the monster he was in Bram Stoker's book. Dracula as an undead hero does not sit well. He is immortal and essentially super-powered and as Holt would have you believe perfect. He gives these powers to two other characters who are equally two dimensional and just loses the non-existent plot. There is no dilemma, no threat and no real lurking presence of evil as in the first book. It is a cnfused mess of poor dialogue, juvenile characterisation, little geographical realism, poor simile and a lack of care.

Now I never expected the grreatest story in the world, but I expected more. Slow moving, hampered by unlikelly dialogue and determined to have a cliffhanger every four or five pages, this is so disappointing. Filling the book with obvious references to characters and actors associated with the Dracula mythos, as well as cramming in any celebs of the time gives a ridiculous post-modern feel to the tale. It would seem that every corner Dracula or his groupies turned, they would bump into someone famous or infamous.

But the biggest crime of all is committed by the Stoker estate. Allowing ideas to be flung at the plot randomly (as with the big, and incredibly obvious secret at the end), and actually letting someone essentially overwrite the original and discount over one-hundred years of history smacks of desperation for cash and the American need of a franchise to rival Ann Rice.

This is poorly researched (Whitby is not next to London...ditto Exeter), poorly thought out and disrepectful to the original. It is a poor sequel, to the Coppola film. To be fair there have been poor sequels before ( and there will be after - offical or otherwise), but they have never diminished the original text as this threatens to do.

Stoker (Bram) would be turning in his grave. Or trying to get out and kill his relatives.

The other one will be counting his cash and not giving a damn.