DRACULA IN LOVE

I have finished reading Dracula in Love.  It got put off for a few weeks while I re-read all 7 Harry Potter books, but during the past week, I was able to finish what I'd started.  It's weird.  It definitely has a great premise and follows a line of thinking that anyone who has read the original Dracula was already thinking--that there was more going on between the Count and Mina than Stoker implied.  (I can't get the italics to work this time to italicize the book title!  Crazy computer.)

With that being said, though, this books takes a very weird turn into even more supernatural characters and events that just aren't as believable as the original.  It is based on the primise that Mina was originally (700 years earlier) the daughter of a fairy queen.  Thus, it was SHE who had originally seduced/charmed the Count and made him what he is, but then she became pregnant, had the baby, and the baby died during a plague epidemic.  Mina, overcome with grief over her baby's death, killed herself, leaving the Count to wonder if she'd ever really loved him in the first place.  So over the course of the next 700 years, the Count who has been immortal, has essentially chased Mina all over the place, but each and every life she's reincarnated in to, she chooses SOMETHING over the Count.

And, yes, in this new life, she chooses the baby she's pregnant with (by Jonathan) over the Count--yet again.  The book does end on a "happy" note in that Mina and Jonathan apparently have a very "happy" marriage (they seem to have lots of sex) while Mina knows that her passion for the Count will one day bring the two of them together again--maybe this next time, for all eternity....


Blah, blah, blah......

It was all just a bit too much for me.  It portrays Dr. Seward, Von Helsing, and Quincey Morris as some of the most evil men ever.  Granted, I don't really believe everyone was as "pure" as Stoker suggests in his Dracula, but at the same time, I don't think they were all so very horrible, either.  Essentially, it's as if every single human being is overcome with sexual desires, but the ones who express their sexual desires are insane and in desperate need of help--help which only exacerbates the so-called problem.

I know I'm not explaining myself well enough for you to understand what I'm talking about if you haven't read the book.  I obviously found it interesting enough to read all the way through to the end, but I promise you that it's not interesting enough that I'll ever read the book again, nor do I recommend it as a book worthy of being shared.