THE DRACULA DOSSIER
James Reese
William Morrow
Suspense
ISBN: 9780061233548
A donor wishing to remain anonymous sends a letter to the William Morrow publishing house, enclosing the Dracula Dossier, a discovery he ran across defined as Item 128 at a Sotheby’s auction. In the letter the donor states, “What you do with the Dossier…is of no import to me. I want neither recompense nor renown, and I will refuse recognition. Simply, as my days decrease and death draws on, I mean to unburden myself of Stoker’s secret. I cannot die with the truth untold, as none alive know what I know.”
What follows is a stunning “miscellany,” a collection of letters written by Bram Stoker to his intimates, plus journal entries by said author, entries to the Metropolitan Police files and clippings from the newspapers of the day. The Dossier leads the reader to believe that Stoker met Jack the Ripper and undertook to stop his murderous rampage. Or did he?
In truth, Stoker may well have been influenced in his writing by the events of 1888, during which time The Ripper claimed five confirmed kills and has another dozen or so attributed to him. James Reese takes us back to that year when a brutal killer terrorized the streets of London.
Stoker was then assisting Henry Irving, a famous stage actor, and keeping very busy at it. He slept odd hours, and fitfully when he slept at all. His dear friend, the novelist Sir Thomas Hall Caine, requested of Stoker that he extend his personal courtesy to an old acquaintance, an American by the name of Dr. Francis Tumblety, whose habits soon began to seem suspect. Stoker came to realize that the sweet scent of flowers was a sure sign that Tumblety was near; in addition to the odor, he could hear him calling his name: Sto-ker, Sto-ker. Or was Stoker perhaps losing his mind? Hearing voices where no one else could and smelling a man’s presence by an omen of flowers hardly sounds like the actions of a sane man. Maybe a man done in by exhaustion or insomnia, or an overactive imagination, for Stoker is known as the author of DRACULA.
Stoker kept company with a host of familiar names, bringing the pages alive with historical celebrities. In addition to Hall Caine and Irving, he was acquainted with Oscar Wilde and more closely with Oscar’s mother Lady Jane Wilde, William Butler Yeats, Walt Whitman --- and quite possibly Jack the Ripper. Yet, while he was working on a way to get the police to take notice of Tumblety, the police had found their own suspect: Stoker himself.
Reese has done his homework well. While a highly entertaining novel, THE DRACULA DOSSIER reads like nonfiction, a feeling that is enhanced by the liberal use of footnotes. It has all the authenticity of a thoroughly researched thesis, but infinitely more fun, with a touch of the occult, synesthesia, loads of biographical tidbits and little-known oddities, and a dark look at a sinister period in London’s past.
--- Reviewed by Kate Ayers
Click here now to buy this book from Amazon.com.
© Copyright 1996-2009, Bookreporter.com. All rights reserved.
