Although I'm not much of a horror fan, I decided to read Dracula since it was considered a classic and was hopefully pretty good. I'm glad I read it. It was a very interesting story. It wasn't what I was expecting. The whole novel is written as if you're reading someone's diary, telegram or news article. It starts with Jonathan Harker(a lawyer if I remember correctly) who is summoned to Count Dracula's castle to help Dracula obtain a home in London. He soon realizes Dracula is no ordinary man, but some kind of beast. This section takes about 1/4 of the book and then, after some deaths surrounded with unusual and frightening circumstances, Jonathan, along with some other interesting characters commit to not only prevent Dracula's move to London, but to kill him. This book was interesting in the fact that it was almost as if Dracula is not the main character of the novel, and I suppose in some ways, he's not. The book focuses much more on this group of people's attempts to hinder Dracula's actions and to cause his demise. Also, I liked reading the book and discovering the original story behind Dracula, not just all of the spoofs and parodies one sees today. I liked finding out that besides not liking garlic, crosses and sunlight, vampires also can't pass running water and can turn into wolves as well as bats. Although I can't say I was ever particularly scared reading this novel(probably because I don't really believe in vampires), I did find this novel to be very good, especially considering horror isn't one of the genres I'm particularly fond of. I definitely think it's worth picking up this book and reading it.

Everyone knows the name "Dracula," but the majority have only seen the legendary Transylvanian Count on the silver screen or through pop culture; few indeed have actually read the work that started it all.

One cannot claim to be a fan of vampire literature or of Dracula himself without having read Bram Stoker's tremendous work of gothic horror. Think that Dracula and other vampires can't be out in daylight? Wrong--they simply have no powers during the day, which you'd know if you read this extraordinary book.

Written in epistolary form (that is, as a series of letters and diary entries), the story is presented from the viewpoints of the main characters, from Jonathan Harker to his wife Mina to Dr. van Helsing. Rather than detracting from the story, this format breaks up what would otherwise be a rather long manuscript into manageable chunks and adds to the historical character of the novel.

Modern film interpretations have presented Stoker's story through the eyes of each producer, director, and screenwriter, with nearly all making wholesale changes--Mina Harker, for instance, is NOT the reborn lost love of Count Dracula as Francis Ford Coppola would have us believe. Many others who have "read" Dracula have done so through abridged texts that distort the story through omission. Pick up and read the story that started it all in its intended format... Bram Stoker's Dracula. You won't regret it.

One of the scariest books in history, DRACULA is nevertheless misunderstood. Our civilization is removed from the Victorian era. We think of it as somehow distant and quaint, and ourselves as modern. But when Bram Stoker published DRACULA in 1897, the Victorian era _was_ modern. Stoker meant to make the book more frightening than most books by bringing an ancient horror into a modern, anti-superstitious world. He uses typewriters and phonograph disks the way a modern writer would refer to the internet and e-mail. DRACULA's first readers might've looked out of their town or country houses and expected to see Dracula's gaunt figure emerging through the fog.

He tells the story through a series of diaries, letters, clippings. Normally this is an unweildy method of storytelling, but in this case it is most effective.

The novel is divided into three broad sections. In the first, young Jonathan Harker and Dracula have the stage almost alone. Though Harker's diary we learn details of his journey through eastern Europe to meet a Count who wants to travel to England, and Harker carries him certain important papers. Count Dracula's character comes across very strong and well-defined, and grows ever menacing as Harker slowly learns he is not going to be allowed back to England, but will become food for Dracula's vampiric harem.

The second part of the book, set in England, deals with Mina Murray, who is going to marry Jonathan; Mina's friend Lucy; three men who are in love with Lucy; and a good-hearted but mysterious Ductch doctor, Abraham van Helsing. The bulk of this part deals with Lucy's mysterious disease, her decline to death, and her transformation into a vampire that her suitors must destroy out of love. Dracula appears only fleetingly through the book, but the reader knows what happens, and suspects the cause of Lucy's decline.

In the last part, Jonathan, Mina, and Lucy's three lovers band with Dr. von Helsing in a pact to destroy Dracula before he can spread his contagion throughout England; and meanwhile, Dracula wreaks his vengeance on them for taking Lucy from him.

Stoker uses many ways of approaching his subject. Occasionally the horror is direct; but once it is established, he makes it subtle, working behind the scenes, in a way that may be even more frightening. Though he also uses different voices, his prose is invariably fine. And as each character has to overcome his aversion to ancient superstition and face Dracula with a mind open to the fact that there's more in the world than science and technology and late-Victorian materialism can contain, the book becomes eerily meaningful for the twenty-first century.

Modern purveyors of vampiric fiction dispense with the blatant Christian symbolism used to fight Dracula's ilk, such as a crucifix or sanctified host, or prayer. They also turn the evil of Dracula topsy-turvey and somehow invent sympathy for soulless monsters who view living humans as food. Stoker doesn't hesitate to show Dracula as an evil, totalitarian horror; as a contagion that must be eradicated; as an enslaver of women, like Lucy, and men, like poor Renfield. And Stoker has reason enough to realized that only Supernatural agencies could fight the supernatural. The saving Blood of Christ on the Cross, blood of which a soulless terror like Dracula cannot drink, is the most effective symbol for fighting and defeating this brand of evil. It was part of the novel's consistency that as the characters have to come to grips with the reality of ancient evil, they must also return to the symbols of good that they also have rejected in a narrow-minded embracing of the modern.

Dracula, the strongest character in Victorian fiction, does not weaken himself by the need to be "understood" or "pitied". He will destroy or be destroyed. And the worst destruction that could happen to him would be mitigation.

DRACULA may be the scariest book ever written; it's certainly the best of the classic horror stories. It's well-crafted and exquisitely constructed enough that it stands as a great novel even without genre pigeonholing.

bram stoker is most famous for dracula. not hard to believe. some of the stories here have even a dull plot. but mostly the problem is that stoker dwells at completely irrelevant things, like melodramatic dialogues going on and on, the building of friendship, etc. he could have done better, he is a good enough writer. but he has a melodramatic string, which destroys. the judge's house is the only story really worth reading.

At times the writing is sensual and evocative as one would expect from Stoker. The story themes range from legendry and quests to evils in both familial associations and on the dramatic stage. A range of stuff capitalizing on the eclectic knowledge of Bram Stoker. But what makes it a good buy? How is it especially useful? It would be indispensible for anyone needing an economical edition, as it contains The Crystal Cup, The Chain of Destiny, The Castle of the King, The Dualitists, and A Star Trap: five stories that appear in addition to some nine stories previously collected in editions of Dracula's Guest.

THESE STORIES CONTAIN SUCH CHILLING, CREATIVE DEPTH. I DO BELIEVE STOKER WAS A GENIUS, NOT JUST ON THE BASIS OF DRACULA BUT ON WORK LIKE THE STORIES PRESENTED IN THIS BOOK. IT'S A PITY THAT HE PROBABLY DIDN'T REALISE THAT HE WAS THE BLUEPRINT FOR THE GREAT MASS MARKET HORROR WRITER, A SORT OF VICTORIAN STEPHEN KING. AN ASTOUNDING COLLECTION OF WORK, VERY CLEVER AND SOPHISTICATED 10 -10