Kim Newman: Anno Dracula

I must admit that I'm one of those old fogies who believes that the best vampire story ever written was by Bram Stoker and the ones that came after really don't match up to it. However, I belong to a SF/F book group and am occasionally forced, therefore, to read vampire tales, more or less under duress. Generally, the stories have reinforced my opinion. Occasionally, though, a story does come close to capturing the flavor of Stoker's novel. Kim Newman's Anno Dracula is one of those rare exceptions.

The story has a rather unusual premise. It, of course, answers one of the two basic questions that SF/Fantasy/Horror asks--"What if?" Actually it answers the question twice: What if vampires exist and what if Van Helsing had failed to kill Count Dracula. Usually alternative history tales turn on events in the real world: What would it be like if the Confederacy had won the Civil War? If Hitler had invaded and conquered England? If the US had been conquered by Japan and Germany in WWII?

This alternative universe story turns not on a real event but on a fictional event--Count Dracula's defeat by Van Helsing in Stoker's novel. The premise is Count Dracula's actions after surviving the attack. As a member of the aristocracy, he would have access to the royal court and to the widowed Queen Victoria. Newman postulates that Count Dracula would have persuaded (hypnotized?) Queen Victoria to marry him. Once he has succeeded, Dracula then becomes the ruler of the British Empire.

Newman does a very credible job of presenting the reactions of the British public to this situation. There are those who are opposed to the union and also to the growing power of the vampires in the Empire. The problem is that being a vampire has certain advantages--an extremely long life, if not actual immortality, and an ability to survive wounds and physical damage that would have killed ordinary humans.

Under these circumstances, many of the English are now opting to become vampires--the "newly born." Opposed to them are the "warms," those who choose to remain human. The "newly borns" are close to gaining almost complete control of the government, such that promotions and position upgrades are almost out of reach for the "warms." In England, everybody fears a civil war between the vampires and the warms. In addition, growing resentment throughout the Empire against the vampires is beginning to fracture it.

Set against this background are a series of horrific murders. Three, or perhaps four, vampire prostitutes have been murdered in Whitechapel, perhaps butchered would be a better term. The murderer, aware of the physical capabilities of the vampires, goes to great lengths to ensure the impossibility of the body to heal itself. Scotland Yard has no clues. The killer comes, kills, and disappears.

One might almost consider this a mystery story, but one that is so deeply steeped in the turn-of-the century fictional London that the setting almost overshadows the attempts to identify and stop the killer.

Charles Beauregard--adventurer, spy, investigator--is a member of the mysterious Diogenes Club. He is summoned one night to a meeting. The Inner Circle of the club assigns him the task of ferreting out the killer. Shortly afterwards, Beauregard takes a cab, a hansom cab of course, and is taken, unwillingly, to a meeting of the Criminal Elite, the rulers of the underworld. They also are concerned about the killings because the police have suddenly become very active-- arresting people, searching various establishments, and thereby disturbing the normal comfortable relationship between the police and the underworld. Beauregard is informed that the killings are bad for business and that he is expected to do something about them--quickly.

My first clue to the nature of Newman's novel arrived early. Beauregard, at home shortly afterwards, has a visitor. It is Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard--yes, the same Lestrade who didn't think much of Sherlock Holmes' newfangled methods, but, being in the neighborhood, dropped by every once in awhile to discuss a particularly puzzling case with him. Unfortunately he can't drop by Baker Street now because Holmes is in Sussex, not on a bee farm but in a concentration camp for those deemed dangerous to the regime. Holmes, it seems, disagreed with the present government about certain policies.

There are other familiar names in Newman's novel. One of the members of the Inner Circle of the Diogenes Club is Mycroft, Holmes' brother. Some of the members of the Criminal Elite are also well-known to readers of Doyle--Professor Moriarty and Colonel Moran. A third member is Chinese, a member of the Si-Fan, the Evil Doctor. Those who have read stories by Sax Rohmer will no doubt recognize Dr. Fu Manchu.

Those who have read Stoker's novel will also find some familiar names. Bram Stoker himself is in the same concentration camp as Holmes. Van Helsing has been executed. Mina Harkness is doing well as a vampire. Florence Stoker (Bram's real wife) is popular among the upper classes as a hostess but is losing her clout because many of the upper classes are turning vampire and her husband's opposition to the vampires is an embarrassment. Jack Seward, the head of the mental institution in Stoker's novel, is now the medical director of a clinic for the poor.

Seward is not the only medical man on the scene, for both Dr. Jekyll and Dr. Moreau make a brief appearance. In fact, Beauregard goes to Dr. Jekyll's laboratory at one point and meets Dr. Moreau there. They also are interested in the Whitechapel killer.

Anno Dracula is not a true "whodunit" for the reader learns early on the identity of the Whitechapel murderer. The interest really is in the depiction of a society that learns that vampires exist and that it must deal with them. One particularly memorable scene occurs at a party when a toast is given. The vampire there does not drink and so is left out. The hostess recognizes the problem and motions a servant over to the vampire. The servant calmly unbuttons the sleeve of her dress and allows the vampire to take some blood from her wrist.

In addition, wondering about the identity of the next fictional character I would meet also kept me turning pages.

Overall Rating: highly recommended for those who enjoy vampire stories. Newman does a superb job of capturing the feel of Stoker's tale and also that of the late 19th century London, both real and fictional.

Combination Plate 3: Thornton Wilder's The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Dickens' A Tale Of Two Cities, and A Matter of Justice by Charles Todd

Thornton Wilder: The Bridge of San Luis Rey, a book discussion group selection. I had always wanted to read this novel but never got around to it. Therefore, when a book group that I belong to selected it, I was pleased. My "one of these days" list is much too long, and this would help shorten it, a bit, anyway.

Wilder doesn't squander any time in getting to the subject. The novel begins "On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travellers into the gulf below. This bridge was on the highroad between Lima and Cuzco and hundreds of persons passed over it every day."

One of the witnesses was Brother Juniper who happened to be approaching the bridge as it broke.

"Anyone else would have said to himself with secret joy: 'Within ten minutes myself...!' But it was another thought that visited Brother Juniper: 'Why did this happen to those five?' If there were any plan in the universe at all, if there were any pattern in a human life, surely it could be discovered mysteriously latent in those lives so suddenly cut off. Either we live by accident and die by accident or we live by plan and die by plan. And on that one instant Brother Juniper made the resolve to inquire into the secret lives of those five persons, that moment falling through the air, and to surprise the reason of their taking off."

The remainder of the novel tells of Brother Juniper's efforts to learn about the five victims and to see if any possible reason could be found for their deaths at that moment and place. I think this is one of the perennial problems or questions that have bothered and bewildered humans since they developed the facility for asking questions. Is there a plan or is it chance that dictates our future?

Does Wilder answer the question? I think he does since he is the one who created the lives of the five victims. If you do decide to read it, let me know if you agree that Wilder answered the question and what you think the answer is.

Overall Rating: Recommended.

===================================================================

Charles Dickens: A Tale of Two Cities, a book discussion group selection. I doubt there's any need to briefly bring up the plot as I suspect most are familiar with it, even if they haven't read it. It's one of Dickens' most serious novels as one doesn't find the numerous caricatures of secondary characters that enliven Dickens' novels, or at least enliven the ones I've read.

I have gained the impression over the years that most people read this in high school for the first time. In fact, the only other novel that is mentioned as frequently as being on an high school reading list is Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter. I wonder if that's still true today.

This novel is unique in that it's the only one I know of that has one of the most famous and most often quoted and misquoted beginnings and endings in all of western literature. They are like bookends, as one of the discussion group members said. The novel begins with:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair..."

But, most often, when it is quoted, the ending is left off or ignored, which gives it a slightly different slant:

"...in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

In other words, it is just like today.


The ending is equally well-known: the narrator tells us that this would have been Sydney Carton's final thought as he awaits the guillotine:

"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."

The one character that stands out the most for me is Madame Defarge. In Greek mythology we find the three fates: Clotho, who spins the thread of life from her distaff onto her spindle; Lachesis, who measures the thread of life allotted to each person; and Atropos, who chose the mode and time of a person's death. Madame Defarge, always knitting, is a symbol of all three, but most strongly I see her as Atropos, the one who decides how and when.

Overall Rating: Recommended, especially if you want to read something by Dickens and don't have much free time. It's one of his shorter novels.

====================================================================

Charles Todd: A Matter of Justice, a mystery series featuring Inspector Ian Rutledge of Scotland Yard. The series is set just after the end of World War I. This novel begins on May 1920. This is the eleventh in the series by Todd, who is/are? in reality a mother-and-son writing team who live on the east coast of the US.

What makes this series stand out from others is the presence of Hamish MacLeod. Rutledge served in the British army during WWI, and his corporal was Hamish MacLeod. Rutledge was wounded in action, and in the hospital he discovered that he could hear the voice of Hamish, not saying things he remembered from the past but commenting on what was currently going on--which was impossible since MacLeod died during the war. Readers can choose to accept Hamish as a spirit/ghost occupying Rutledge's mind or see him as Rutledge's way of punishing himself for MacLeod's death. Hamish doesn't think much of Rutledge's abilities as a police officer and often offers his own interpretation of the clues and regularly delivers his own opinions about the various suspects.

A Matter of Justice is a somewhat convoluted novel in which the reader knows more from the beginning about the crime than Rutledge does for about four-fifths of the novel. The interest here is whether Rutledge, with Hamish's help (or hindrance?), will be able to overcome the hostility of the local police officer and get to the root of the crime, which actually extends back before WWI, to another war which the British might well want to forget about, the Boer War.

Overall Rating: recommended for those who enjoy police procedurals, the time and setting just after WWI in England, and a touch of the supernatural, perhaps.

====================================================================

Charlaine Harris: Dead Until Dark, a book discussion group selection. SGRVM says it all--Southern Gothic Romantic Vampire Mystery.

This is the novel that is the basis for the HBO series, True Blood. The heroine is a telepathic waitress named Sookie Stackhouse, who falls in love with a vampire named Bill. Her boss at the diner is Mel, who, unbeknownst to her, is a shape changer. And, then there's a serial killer running around who always drives a wooden stake into the heart of his/her victims.

Overall Rating: great book for a discussion group--excellent for comedy relief from more serious works.