Being geeks, you will probably know Fred Saberhagen, either from his Berserker series, or his Book of Swords series. (My personal favorite. If you haven’t read it, you’re totally missing out, run right out and buy it.)
The Dracula series, however seems to be a bit more obscure. I’d never heard of it until I set my reading goal for the year (100) and focus (vampires). I’ve read a LOT of vampire books in the last 9 months. I read the entire Ann Rice series. No offense to any fans out there, but ugh. When I saw that one of my favorite authors had written not only a vampire series, but one about Dracula, I was intrigued. So I got them all and sat down with a slightly biased, but open mind.
As I started “The Dracula Tape” the first thought that ran through my head was “Mr. Saberhagen WTF did you DO?!” It was Roshamon but badly done. However, I kept reading because his style will just draw you in. I started to see what is plan was, to not really make Dracula an “anti-hero”, but at least a semi-protagonist. He’s not one you will necessarily love, or even love to hate, he’s rather one that you will enjoy (I think) trying to understand. Saberhagen keeps much of the Tepes lore in the character which can be amusing in the various centuries the books take place.
So, while I still haven’t found my All Time Favorite Vampire series, I found one that I actually liked better than I thought I would. And IMHO it’s a much better read than the Rice books.
3.5 Geeks 