this book was so, so, so disappointing.

it’s actually quite interesting, because the first few chapters were incredible. the gothic, baroque writing style. the ruined, isolated decaying castle. the homoeroticism. the gaslighting of poor ole Jonathan. the absolute absurdity of his situation, and dracula’s poorly concealed hostility towards him………..

hell, even the subtle commentary on the predation on women! (which unfortunately takes an anti immigration turn, instead of an ardently feminist one, about how man’s ambition and casual disregard of their surroundings lead to women as collateral damage…)

however, as soon as count dracula left his castle the entire story began to fall apart. also, van helsing is such a fucking mary sue character. like genuinely. i cannot stand mary sues!!!!!!!!!!! this work is also so disturbingly misogynistic…justice for lucy! justice for mina! justice for dracula’s women!

the writing itself is incredibly repetitive and overexplains to the reader whats going on. to be honest, this is part of the difference between the beginning part and all of the latter parts. the beginning sets up so much, relying only on implication, subtlety. it respects the readers intelligence, allowing them to puzzle out what’s going on. only for it to be explained in excruciating detail later on in the narrative in an honestly infuriating exposition dump, given by..none other than…you guessed it…this story’s resident mary sue. -_-

Dracula is, at its thematic core, deeply invested in anxieties that i personally abhor. the fear of foreign contamination, the obsessive policing of female sexuality, the fantasy of restoring patriarchal order through violence. it’s afraid of ‘reverse colonization’, modernity’s discontents, the erosion of traditional masculine authority….The novel’s ideological project (inoculating England against degeneracy by destroying the Eastern invader) is just so worthless, it’s hard to understand what is the point of a novel such as this.

the book mourns things that would actually be good. and it positions as monstrous exactly what might represent liberation or change, then mobilizes its entire cast to crush these possibilities. dracula makes lucy desire? horror! he exists outside English control systems? unacceptable! the “happy ending” is just calcified patriarchy and xenophobia winning.

the action is terrible, the plot drags, and fundamentally, i reject what this book is trying to do. it’s thematic foundation is garbage.

anyway, this isn’t the full review…just needed to put something here so the page would show up…i will update soon….