thealienamongus's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
informative
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.0
nyarlathotep's review against another edition
3.0
An interesting look at the sources of Vampire fiction, but I admit I found many of the stories dry and hard to read.
endlessreader's review against another edition
4.0
Ahh, vampires! Seriously, who doesn't love them? They have this alluring sensuality to them. Either that or they're down-right vicious. Needless to say, that the vampire has undergone a transformation as of late. They are no longer that alluring (to me anyway) and definitely not vicious. Not only have the Twilight books skewed the vision of the brutal and vicious vampire, it has made them sparkle. This is atrocious. Vampires aren't supposed to sparkle! They're supposed to kill you or turn you. Not walk along professing their "love" for a mortal. (Although, Edward was controlling as old-fashioned vampires are, so there's that). It's not only the Twilight series which has changed the vampire. Buffy (as much as I loved the show), took the award for the most angsty vampire with Angel. Whoever heard of a vampire with a soul before that? Then, they go and give awesomely vicious and brutal Spike a soul, too! Gah! But I'm happy to say that Dracula's Guest takes us back to the glory days where vampires were evil, not pretty boys with angst to rival that of teenage girls.
So, okay, these vampires aren't like those vampires in the film 30 Days of Night (weren't those vampires just scary as all hell?), but they're still pretty creepy. Dracula's Guest is an anthology of classic, victorian, vampire stories. Granted, I haven't read every single story, yet (I like to dip into short stories rather than read them in one go), but I've read more than half of them and most of them are pretty damn great. At first I thought I'd have trouble reading these stories since they are classics and those are sometimes pretty dry, but they ended up being page-turners. So much that I ended up reading way into the night without realizing it and then had to watch Andy Richter Controls the Universe to get vampire thoughts out of my head (which didn't really work considering that as soon as I was drifting off, my smoke alarm went off, for no apparent reason, and I jumped up and looked out the window to make sure there wasn't a creepy, pallid, face peering into mine. There wasn't, FYI).
I have to say that my favorites (so far) have to be The Family of Vourdalak by Alexsei Tolstoy and Wake Not the Dead by Johann Ludwig Tieck. The first just has the creepiest vampire who would look into his family's windows with a, you guessed it, creepy, pallid, face. Wake Not the Dead had the most vicious, manipulative, and FEMALE vampire. Add in numerous people telling the douche-bag husband "wake not the dead" and you have a story that's all types of win. Plus, there are numerous "true stories" that just really make the anthology not only scary, but interesting because you get to see what vampire customs (the garlic, the whole "they must be welcomed in" theory, etc.) started where or how they started.
So, again, while I haven't finished every single story in Dracula's Guest, the good ones seem to outweight the clunkers from what I have read. And I for one rejoice in the return of the viciousness of vampires. The angsty ones can just take a hike and take there melodramatic and pathetic girlfriends with them.
Edited to add that I actually finished the whole anthology today (a mere day after submitting my partial review; so much for dipping into it occasionally) and while I liked the first half better than the second half, I still think that the four star rating should stand. The stories that I thought were particular gems were What Was It? (Though not really a vampire story, I just thought it was weird and bizzare), Good Lady Ducayne (while not scary at all, it really was interesting and I liked that there were parallels between this story and the Elizabeth Bathory history), and And the Creature Came In (I don't know what it is with vampires and windows, but I don't think I'll ever look out the window with a sense of comfort ever again). I didn't really find any stories that I clicked with in Part III, but I think that's because there were only four of them while there were more in the previous parts. But still really great anthology and I have no doubt that I'll re-read my favorites when Halloween rolls around.
P.S. This is a First Reads Win
So, okay, these vampires aren't like those vampires in the film 30 Days of Night (weren't those vampires just scary as all hell?), but they're still pretty creepy. Dracula's Guest is an anthology of classic, victorian, vampire stories. Granted, I haven't read every single story, yet (I like to dip into short stories rather than read them in one go), but I've read more than half of them and most of them are pretty damn great. At first I thought I'd have trouble reading these stories since they are classics and those are sometimes pretty dry, but they ended up being page-turners. So much that I ended up reading way into the night without realizing it and then had to watch Andy Richter Controls the Universe to get vampire thoughts out of my head (which didn't really work considering that as soon as I was drifting off, my smoke alarm went off, for no apparent reason, and I jumped up and looked out the window to make sure there wasn't a creepy, pallid, face peering into mine. There wasn't, FYI).
I have to say that my favorites (so far) have to be The Family of Vourdalak by Alexsei Tolstoy and Wake Not the Dead by Johann Ludwig Tieck. The first just has the creepiest vampire who would look into his family's windows with a, you guessed it, creepy, pallid, face. Wake Not the Dead had the most vicious, manipulative, and FEMALE vampire. Add in numerous people telling the douche-bag husband "wake not the dead" and you have a story that's all types of win. Plus, there are numerous "true stories" that just really make the anthology not only scary, but interesting because you get to see what vampire customs (the garlic, the whole "they must be welcomed in" theory, etc.) started where or how they started.
So, again, while I haven't finished every single story in Dracula's Guest, the good ones seem to outweight the clunkers from what I have read. And I for one rejoice in the return of the viciousness of vampires. The angsty ones can just take a hike and take there melodramatic and pathetic girlfriends with them.
Edited to add that I actually finished the whole anthology today (a mere day after submitting my partial review; so much for dipping into it occasionally) and while I liked the first half better than the second half, I still think that the four star rating should stand. The stories that I thought were particular gems were What Was It? (Though not really a vampire story, I just thought it was weird and bizzare), Good Lady Ducayne (while not scary at all, it really was interesting and I liked that there were parallels between this story and the Elizabeth Bathory history), and And the Creature Came In (I don't know what it is with vampires and windows, but I don't think I'll ever look out the window with a sense of comfort ever again). I didn't really find any stories that I clicked with in Part III, but I think that's because there were only four of them while there were more in the previous parts. But still really great anthology and I have no doubt that I'll re-read my favorites when Halloween rolls around.
P.S. This is a First Reads Win
joecam79's review against another edition
4.0
I recently picked up this anthology again after a hiatus of three years and finished reading it over a weekend. To be honest I can’t really explain why I had lost interest midway through it the first-time round, because this is a highly readable anthology of vampire tales.
The book’s subtitle – A Connoisseur’s Collection of Victorian Vampire Stories – gives a good indication of what lies buried between its covers. I’m not too sure, however, whether it is helpful to describe the works within as “Victorian”, which suggests that the stories are exclusively by English authors of (more or less) the 19th Century. Although the Victorian era is the main source for the material in this anthology, editor Michael Sims casts his net much wider. He starts, for instance with two accounts of purportedly real-life vampiric manifestations, by 18th Century French authors Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d’Argens and Antoine Augustin Calmet. There follow Lord Byron’s “The End of My Journey” and Polidori’s “The Vampire”, generally considered the prototypes of English vampire fiction. Again, they precede the Victorian era. On the other hand, M.R. James’s classic story “Count Magnus” and Alice and Claude Askew’s “Aylmer Vance and the Vampire” are probably too late to be considered “Victorian”.
Alongside British authors, Sims includes works by Continental (Johann Ludwig Tieck, Gautier, Aleksei Tolstoy) and American (Mary E. Wilkins Freeman) authors. For greater variety, the anthology also features “vampires” of a figurative nature – indeed, whilst all tales feature the supernatural, some of the ‘monsters’ within are not always of the bloodsucking type.
As for this being a “connoisseur’s collection”, I would say that this is a fair description. Editor Michael Sims cannily mixes the familiar with unfamiliar, with works by established authors of horror fiction (Bram Stoker, M.R. James) sitting alongside lesser-known pieces – such as an extract from Emily Gerard’s retellings of Transylvanian lore, which would exert a marked influence on Stoker’s Dracula. This should make this volume attractive both to newcomers to the genre and to more seasoned vampire buffs. A foreword to the collection and a brief biographical introduction to each story completes a captivating anthology.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/2019/12/dracula-connoisseurs-collection-victorian-vampire-stories.html
The book’s subtitle – A Connoisseur’s Collection of Victorian Vampire Stories – gives a good indication of what lies buried between its covers. I’m not too sure, however, whether it is helpful to describe the works within as “Victorian”, which suggests that the stories are exclusively by English authors of (more or less) the 19th Century. Although the Victorian era is the main source for the material in this anthology, editor Michael Sims casts his net much wider. He starts, for instance with two accounts of purportedly real-life vampiric manifestations, by 18th Century French authors Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d’Argens and Antoine Augustin Calmet. There follow Lord Byron’s “The End of My Journey” and Polidori’s “The Vampire”, generally considered the prototypes of English vampire fiction. Again, they precede the Victorian era. On the other hand, M.R. James’s classic story “Count Magnus” and Alice and Claude Askew’s “Aylmer Vance and the Vampire” are probably too late to be considered “Victorian”.
Alongside British authors, Sims includes works by Continental (Johann Ludwig Tieck, Gautier, Aleksei Tolstoy) and American (Mary E. Wilkins Freeman) authors. For greater variety, the anthology also features “vampires” of a figurative nature – indeed, whilst all tales feature the supernatural, some of the ‘monsters’ within are not always of the bloodsucking type.
As for this being a “connoisseur’s collection”, I would say that this is a fair description. Editor Michael Sims cannily mixes the familiar with unfamiliar, with works by established authors of horror fiction (Bram Stoker, M.R. James) sitting alongside lesser-known pieces – such as an extract from Emily Gerard’s retellings of Transylvanian lore, which would exert a marked influence on Stoker’s Dracula. This should make this volume attractive both to newcomers to the genre and to more seasoned vampire buffs. A foreword to the collection and a brief biographical introduction to each story completes a captivating anthology.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/2019/12/dracula-connoisseurs-collection-victorian-vampire-stories.html
happentobeshort's review
4.0
Just when I thought I had already scoped out all the good books in my uni library, a new one pokes out it's spine at me and makes me drop whatever I'm reading to read it instead. I am a big baby when it comes to scary movies. They just get to me in ways I can't shake. But strangely enough I love gothic fiction???? It does spook me at times but it just doesn't frighten me in the way The Ring did. This was such a lovely collection of vampire stories both pre and post Bram Stoker. Even with a couple hella gay ones thrown in. Sims always introduces each story with a bit of background to give it context so you can understand them a bit better. Which as a person who's never studied literature, I really appreciated. Definitely a book I might want to buy for my own collection one day.
https://hercommonplaceblog.wordpress.com/
https://hercommonplaceblog.wordpress.com/
joecam79's review
4.0
I recently picked up this anthology again after a hiatus of three years and finished reading it over a weekend. To be honest I can’t really explain why I had lost interest midway through it the first-time round, because this is a highly readable anthology of vampire tales.
The book’s subtitle – A Connoisseur’s Collection of Victorian Vampire Stories – gives a good indication of what lies buried between its covers. I’m not too sure, however, whether it is helpful to describe the works within as “Victorian”, which suggests that the stories are exclusively by English authors of (more or less) the 19th Century. Although the Victorian era is the main source for the material in this anthology, editor Michael Sims casts his net much wider. He starts, for instance with two accounts of purportedly real-life vampiric manifestations, by 18th Century French authors Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d’Argens and Antoine Augustin Calmet. There follow Lord Byron’s “The End of My Journey” and Polidori’s “The Vampire”, generally considered the prototypes of English vampire fiction. Again, they precede the Victorian era. On the other hand, M.R. James’s classic story “Count Magnus” and Alice and Claude Askew’s “Aylmer Vance and the Vampire” are probably too late to be considered “Victorian”.
Alongside British authors, Sims includes works by Continental (Johann Ludwig Tieck, Gautier, Aleksei Tolstoy) and American (Mary E. Wilkins Freeman) authors. For greater variety, the anthology also features “vampires” of a figurative nature – indeed, whilst all tales feature the supernatural, some of the ‘monsters’ within are not always of the bloodsucking type.
As for this being a “connoisseur’s collection”, I would say that this is a fair description. Editor Michael Sims cannily mixes the familiar with unfamiliar, with works by established authors of horror fiction (Bram Stoker, M.R. James) sitting alongside lesser-known pieces – such as an extract from Emily Gerard’s retellings of Transylvanian lore, which would exert a marked influence on Stoker’s Dracula. This should make this volume attractive both to newcomers to the genre and to more seasoned vampire buffs. A foreword to the collection and a brief biographical introduction to each story completes a captivating anthology.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/2019/12/dracula-connoisseurs-collection-victorian-vampire-stories.html
The book’s subtitle – A Connoisseur’s Collection of Victorian Vampire Stories – gives a good indication of what lies buried between its covers. I’m not too sure, however, whether it is helpful to describe the works within as “Victorian”, which suggests that the stories are exclusively by English authors of (more or less) the 19th Century. Although the Victorian era is the main source for the material in this anthology, editor Michael Sims casts his net much wider. He starts, for instance with two accounts of purportedly real-life vampiric manifestations, by 18th Century French authors Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d’Argens and Antoine Augustin Calmet. There follow Lord Byron’s “The End of My Journey” and Polidori’s “The Vampire”, generally considered the prototypes of English vampire fiction. Again, they precede the Victorian era. On the other hand, M.R. James’s classic story “Count Magnus” and Alice and Claude Askew’s “Aylmer Vance and the Vampire” are probably too late to be considered “Victorian”.
Alongside British authors, Sims includes works by Continental (Johann Ludwig Tieck, Gautier, Aleksei Tolstoy) and American (Mary E. Wilkins Freeman) authors. For greater variety, the anthology also features “vampires” of a figurative nature – indeed, whilst all tales feature the supernatural, some of the ‘monsters’ within are not always of the bloodsucking type.
As for this being a “connoisseur’s collection”, I would say that this is a fair description. Editor Michael Sims cannily mixes the familiar with unfamiliar, with works by established authors of horror fiction (Bram Stoker, M.R. James) sitting alongside lesser-known pieces – such as an extract from Emily Gerard’s retellings of Transylvanian lore, which would exert a marked influence on Stoker’s Dracula. This should make this volume attractive both to newcomers to the genre and to more seasoned vampire buffs. A foreword to the collection and a brief biographical introduction to each story completes a captivating anthology.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/2019/12/dracula-connoisseurs-collection-victorian-vampire-stories.html
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