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I finished reading The Historian! I finished reading The Historian! Well, I think it is worth getting excited about.

It was an arduous read and I am just happy to be finished. I’m happy because I no longer have to look at it sitting on my shelf taunting me with its hidden treasures and unknown delights. I now know that The Historian’s treasures are deeply buried under mountains of erudition and painfully slow plotting. I suspect the meandering narrative is meant to build  apprehension and suspense. It is more likely to induce coma.

It’s not all yawn inspiring though. The characters travel to European places steeped in tradition and superstition:  Istanbul, Budapest, Bulgaria, and Romania.  Kostova does a lovely job constructing vivid landscapes and cultural nuances, which makes me want to visit all of these places now. Well, maybe not Romania but Budapest and Turkey are climbing my travel wish list. They haven’t surpassed Belgium yet (how can you not like a country that prides itself on making the world’s best French fries, beer, and chocolate?) but I digress.

There is so much historical detail about 15th and 16th century Eastern Europe that I assume Kostova has a degree or two in this area. I suppose the author was trying to get some value for her expensive and extensive postsecondary education. I too know the heartbreak of trying to find an economically lucrative use for a humanities degree. Looks like she has me beat there.

Kostova clearly does not have a degree in Vampirism (is there such a thing? That would be awesome). Her information regarding vampires may be erroneous in some areas. Granted, I learned all of my lore from Bram Stoker, Joss Whedon, and Anne Rice; however, there is an overriding consensus on the proper w:ay to kill vampires: beheading, fire, and a wooden stake through the heart. So why do Kostova’s characters carry guns with silver bullets and fancy silver letter-opener type instruments? We’re not hunting werewolves people. They should be armed with wooden stakes, battle axes (for the beheading) and maybe some matches.

For those of you not familiar with The Historian, the story is told by a young, unnamed female protagonist in the year 1976. She finds a strange book in her father’s library, blank except for an engraving of a dragon. With the book she finds several letters, the first begins ” My Dear and unfortunate successor.” So begins a tale that recounts an extended pursuit of knowledge for the history of Vlad the Impaler, a search for his final resting place, and proof that Vlad/Dracula still lives, in an undead capacity.

It is fair to say that this is epistolary novel; we learn everything through the reading of letters that span a number of generations: her father Paul’s letters, her mother Helen’s letters, and the scribing of one Professor Rossi ( Helen’s father and Paul’s mentor). In fact there are so many letters that it feels as if we are reading letters inside of letters, which gets a bit confusing. Paul, Helen, and Rossi, in addition to a number of minor characters, spend considerable effort searching for Dracula and meticulously documenting their efforts in personal correspondence. In this respect, the narrative contrivance (the all-informing letter) wears thin. In one particular instance, Rossi finds himself in a compromising situation that does not lend itself to thoughtful composition. Yet he finds the time and energy to write long, detailed and grammatically impeccable prose.

Of course, all of these people are academics, historians in fact, so maybe we can dismiss the erudite prose as a symptom of their trade. Kostova’s Dracula is somewhat of a historian as well. Yes, he is more than sexy brooding immortal. He is narcissistic to the extreme; however, as all of his research concerns his own mythology.

The revelations come slowly in The Historian and when they arrive, they are underwhelming. The clues are methodically and painstakingly connected; however, by the time these connections are made, I found myself forgetting their original significance.

Despite all this, I cannot say that I disliked this book. I enjoyed the mood, the subject matter, and the characters. Helen and Paul are nice enough people but I really liked Dr. Turgut Bora, their dinner host and fellow Dracula hunter. He is charming and warm yet mysterious, belonging to a secret society dating back to the Ottoman Empire. I also liked the vampire librarian that stalks Paul and Helen across the European continent — he is thorough, and a good librarian should always be thorough.

Elizabeth Kostova is good writer and an intense researcher. She devoted ten years of her life to writing of this novel and she deserves some kudos for her committment. Unfortunately, she becomes entirely too engrossed in her subject, forgetting that the reader might not be all that interested in EVERY SINGLE DETAIL of the Byzantine and Ottoman empires.

Nevertheless, I am still interested in the movie adaptation that is currently in development. I wonder who will play Dracula? I’m voting for Joaquin Phoenix. Maybe he can go on Dave Letterman in full method acting mode and practice. 

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