The Historian is a novel in search of a coherent narrative structure and a paring knife. The premise is interesting enough, if a bit rehashed: the vampire Dracula is alive and well in the mid-20th century and making life difficult for several scholars around the world. Rarely has a novel made such a concerted effort to depict life in academia with what is intended to be excitement. but any thrills the plot generates are effectively rendered stillborn by the plodding pace and the novel’s baffling construction. Flashbacks can be an effective narrative device if used judiciously. Unfortunately, the author chooses to tell much of the story via extended flashbacks that kill the forward momentum of the main story. And then there are the flashbacks-within-flashbacks. I’m not one of your MFA instructors, Ms. Kostova. Put away your bag of tricks and just tell the damn story. And quit having your characters exclaim “Alas!” and “Alack!” Even during the Eisenhower years, nobody talked like this.
Overall, this is a mediocre retread of vampire mythos. You’re better off picking up Bram Stoker’s classic. It’s shorter and the dialog, while baroque, is less likely to make your eyes roll.
Next up is Robert Charles Wilson’s Spin.
My main complaint about the novel is that when we FINALLY meet Dracula, King of the Vampires, Undead Fiend, we learn… that he’s a frickin’ librarian. Laaaaame.