A review by leelah
Anno Dracula: Johnny Alucard by Kim Newman

4.0

4 stars read for me.

Eleven years ago Kim Newman showed us he can take a legend and create something new, original and fun. Almost a decade later, when vampires are so present and usual they have their own genre in literature, it's almost sardonic he can still play with Dracula myth and reinvent him all over. :)
Before I even got into story I gave a plus to Kim Newman for he dedicated this novel to big [a:F. Paul Wilson|20561|F. Paul Wilson|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1210613635p2/20561.jpg], whose Adversary Cycle and Repairman Jack series certainly made an influence on Newman's vision (if inserting Wilson's character in his world and to our amusement wasn't a clue enough). :)
This novel is a journey of Johnny Alucard, a true son of his father. His native land,place of his origins-Romania isn't fit for vampire of his ambition, but glitter and shine of Hollywood certainly proved to be. Like in previous novels, Dracula's manipulations are led by human weaknesses, greed and addiction. There is this constant message that Newman likes to tie with his story- evil is strong as much as we are weak. There is many hidden notes and jokes, but they are easy to pick up if you read KN before. His Johnny Alucard reads like anthology as we're going from Coppola, to Andy Warhol and finally Hollywood. Newman showed us he can twist history in fun, if not even sarcastic way when he married Queen Victoria to Dracula, but in Johnny Alucard this distorted view of history of cinematography is downright astounding. Newman is a film critic also and his knowledge, familiarity with work and lives of figures of that time is so rich and almost palpable while you're reading. He was always a master of inserting famous people and fictional characters in Anno Dracula series (some of them directly, some of them in more subtle way) and in Johnny Alucard he did it more than ever.
Johnny Dracula also feature Geneviève Dieudonné, my first vampire girl-crush, as well as Kate Reed. Geneviève still rocks.:)
The reason for my star reduction lies in episodic style of this novel. As much as I liked it in Diogenes Club, some chapters in Johnny Alucard that were written like scripts downplayed enjoyment for me. In acknowledgements Newman writes:"Sections of this novel have appeared, in slightly different form, disguised as novellas...", so that could be the reason behind it.