Enjoying The Rain & Yep, Another One!

While we're not getting a direct hit from tropical storm Humberto here in New Orleans, we are getting a good bit of rain from it, and that makes me happy! It's been pretty dry down here lately. We've had the occasional Summer shower here and there, but nothing substantial. We're supposed to have rain for the rest of the afternoon and all into the night, which will fit the mood of The Historian perfectly! So my plans for the rest of the afternoon are to sit outside underneath the patio with some coffee enjoying the rain and reading The Historian which I have been loving...and I'm only 200 pages into it.

This will be the last book in my Dracula series, and I'm really glad I chose to start off the RIP challenge in that way. These three books have gone together really well. Dracula and Renfield were both excellent books, but neither really gave me that eerie, spooky, creepy feeling...The Historian does, and I love it for that! It's the first book that's really captured that mood for me. Reading these books in this series type of way has also helped me to appreciate Stoker's work even more than I already did. With both Renfield and The Historian, I get to re-examine parts of Bram Stoker's original masterpiece and see the amazing influence that he had on other writers and really on society in general!

Different topic - I'm joining another challenge :p Kailana is sponsoring this one in memory of her dog Sandy who passed away the other day. She was a beautiful dog and I know that her and Kailana had a very special relationship. I'm a dog lover myself, so I can empathize with her and I think that this is a wonderful idea for a challenge. Its' the Four-Legged Friends Challenge and the challenge is to read 3-5 books with animals as a central character. Here are my books:

1. Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo
2. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo
3. Surrender by Sonya Hartnett
4. Varjak Paw by S.F. Said
5. Watership Down by Richard Adams

While reading these, I'll be thinking of my little white mini poodle, Buddy. Me and Megan bought Buddy together 6 months before Katrina. He's the sweetest dog that I've ever met and has the cutest personality that I've seen in a dog. He's as curious as a cat and is always looking to get into anything that he can. His favorite trick is "give me a kiss" and he does great little "jump in the air and spin around" tricks :) When Katrina came, Buddy evacuated with Megan, so I don't get to see him too often these days, but whenever I make trips to visit with Megan, he gets super excited and cuddles up in the bed right between me and Megan when we go to sleep. It'll be nice to be all back together in one place again soon.

Dracula by Bram Stoker

Books like Bram Stoker's Dracula become so ingrained into our culture that we often let them slip by without ever reading them, assuming that we know what they're all about. There are many books that I've done this with. I'm guilty of making a comment on Nymeth's recent review of Dr. Jekkyl and Mr. Hyde about most probably not reading it because "I know the story." After reading Dracula, I think I'm going to make a special effort to go out and read The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
I did know the basic story of Dracula, but it was so much more detailed than what I knew and told in such a beautiful language. It's a true gothic masterpiece, truly a work of literature. I never knew that it was told in the form of journal entries, telegrams, and letters. I didn't know a few of the characters that are in the book, and I certainly didn't know how gifted Stoker was as a writer.

It's amazing how these works of horror have lived on in our culture and have moved from a work of minor fiction in it's origins into a major piece of mythology today. The character of Dracula has morphed into something that I'm sure Stoker could've never imagined. I only wish that everyone actually knew Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula as well as they know the novel's namesake character. The story of Lucy Westenra is truly one of the most horrific and tragic stories and one that I would've never known had I never read this book. Mina Harker's slow battle with Dracula's bite is one of the most suspenseful plot lines that I've read and I can't even imagine being her husband, Jonathan Harker!

Then there are characters like the delightfully creepy and insane Renfield...the subject of my next RIP book. There is the keeper of the sanitarium where Renfield lives and the doctor who seeks Lucy's hand and treats her, Dr. Seward, and then there is of course the wonderful Dr. Van Helsing.

I'm glad to have finally read this one, and it's the perfect kick off to the RIP Challenge! It will set the mood nicely for the next two months. The next two books will continue the Dracula theme. Next up is Renfield: Slave of Dracula by Barbara Hambly, which focuses on our spider and fly eating friend; and then, of course, is The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova.