What Is It?
In her first novel, Elizabeth Kostova revisits not only the Dracula myth of the past, but the complete format of Bram Stoker’s original novel. She artfully expands the idea of telling the story through letters, journals, newspaper clippings, and historical records. This weaves a story through the several time periods and an onslaught of characters who are still amazingly easy to follow. (There is already a movie in the works.)
How Was It?
This book gets started at a great pace. We are hearing about vampires from the beginning. There are plenty of strange things as well as fascinating histories. This book was a pleasure to read. The only disappointment was the ending. It’s just very odd to go through so much fear and darkness, twists and turns, as well as romance and adventure just to find out that (Spoiler) Dracula simply wants a really good librarian.
Is It Good For Children?
It will be way too much for most kids. The book is usually more creepy than scary but , it’s still written for an older audience.
What About Spiritual Issues?
The issues of sex and marriage are brought up several times. By the end we have 3 main couples who have all had encounters with each other before marriage: one with failed plans to marry, one did marry, and the third is left ambiguous.
More to the point, the Dracula mythos is filled with Christian symbolism. Vampires are the cruel parody of Christ stopped by a crucifix. In this book most of the characters are "Scalars" and that is taken to be equivalent with an atheist, as if that is an educated position. It does turn out that crucifixes work, but not because of any power of Christ. At one point, a Muslim is going to stop a vampire. W hen offered a crucifix, he explains that here they have their own myths and symbols for good. He then proceeds to use Muslim prayer beads with the same effect.
With this, we find all religion reduced to personal preference, cultural standards, and simple symbolism for the natural world and goodness. This, of course, is not what the Bible teaches about the truth of God. It is then a second false message to put the two religious ideas in a context where they are interchangeable. Both have different beliefs and subscribing to either will logically negates the other.
What Is Your Recommendation?
"The Historian" is, from what I have read, becoming the next big thing in the book world. So it may be worthwhile to discuss it with friends and colleagues who have already read it. Otherwise, it’s a big long book, with a letdown of an ending laced with anti-Christian ideas.
(I’m going back to Stoker’s book.)
