fun for the ridiculously fannish

[kindkit]

I recently learned, through the "about the author" blurb on a short story of his that I was reading in an anthology, that sf/horror writer Kim Newman's website is named after Johnny Alucard. Alucard, you may recall, is the character played by the delectable Christopher Neame in Dracula A.D. 1972.

Furthermore, Newman's forthcoming novel in his Anno Dracula series will be called Johnny Alucard. There are NO WORDS for how thrilling I find this.

I immediately started reading the earlier novels in the series. I've finished the first, Anno Dracula, and started the second, The Bloody Red Baron. Anno Dracula is basically a Bram Stoker AU fic in which Dracula's plan to take over Britain succeeds. It's set in 1888 and features the Ripper murders, the Diogenes Club, and most of your favorite characters from the period turning up in major or minor roles. The novel has flaws (the structure and pacing are awkward, the characterization could be more complex, Newman has a dreadful tendency to use epithets [e.g. "the Guardsman," "the Carpathian"] rather than characters' names, I'm still trying to decide if the bit about the Cleveland Street raid and its aftermath is homophobic, and I don't like how he wrote my beloved Raffles), but it's mostly a lot of very readable fun and I enjoyed playing "spot the fandom."

The Bloody Red Baron is set during the First World War, as you might have guessed. I'm only 30 or so pages in, but it has vampire!Biggles in it. Also, so far, Bertie Wooster, Ashenden the British agent, and a mention of "the Duke of Denver's younger brother."

Comments

[calliopes_pen]

It would appear that we're both devouring the series at wild speeds at the same time. I read Anno Dracula, followed by The Bloody Red Baron in the course of maybe 4 days (would have been three, but I had a time out due to a migraine.)

I'm about to start on the third this evening, and I've actually decided to be insane enough to sign up for it for Yuletide.

(Also loved the reference to Johnny Alucard.)

[kindkit]

I find I'm not loving The Bloody Red Baron so far--I'm a hundred-odd pages in, now--but maybe it gets better.

[calliopes_pen]

Toward the end is when I started to enjoy it more. That was just because I liked the murder mystery aspect (you'll know what I mean when you get there, since I won't be spoiling it for you) more than the whole thing with shooting at planes during World War I in that time period.

[kindkit]

Hmm. See, I like the "shooting at planes during World War I" thing and I feel like I'm not getting enough of it. Not battle scenes necessarily, but I'm interested in the experience of war and there's very little of it so far. Also I'm troubled by the literal demonization of the Germans.

[calliopes_pen]

While trying to avoid saying anything in regards to any particular character, I'll say that there is a bit more involving the war/a battle scene on the ground.