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722 of 807 people found the following review helpful:
This is an exciting novel!, June 14, 2005
This debut novel from Kostova contains elements from many of my favorite genres - thriller, suspense, mystery, historical fiction, and vampire lore. It is no surprise then that this supremely intelligent story was a very entertaining read. Though I feel that the story concept and character development deserve five stars, I feel that there are a few important flaws in this book which put it into the four star category.
First the good: All of the characters in this tale are very believable, including Vlad Tepes himself. I really enjoyed the historical facts surrounding the Ottoman Empire and Eastern Europe that Kostova weaved into her tale. I also loved the way she used letters to reveal the more thrilling aspects of the story bit by bit. This kept me in that "I'll just read ten more pages" mode on many a late night.
Now for the problems: The first 300 pages of this book were very compelling and hard to put down. Somewhere between page 300 and 450 it began to feel like Kostova had an old graduate school dissertaion on the migration patterns of monks in the 15th century lying around so she decided to work it into the story. Wow did that slow the pace... I don't have a problem with the storyline taking the characters on a search for the history of these monks, its just that Kostova occasionally strayed across the line between entertaining fiction and dry academic research.
All of that said, my opinion as a librarian and avid reader of such stories is that this is an excellent book, well worth reading. I am sure that it will have wide appeal and is no doubt deserved of its huge marketing push. I have heard that there is already talk of a movie...
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462 of 551 people found the following review helpful:
A suspenseful, literary novel, June 14, 2005
The marketing campaign is underway and Elizabeth Kostova's debut novel is already being hyped as the "Dracula Code" or some similar slogan. I disagree with that approach, not just because they are quite different in more ways than just storyline, but because "The Da Vinci Code" was a good thriller with elements of history mixed in, but it is not even in the same league with this book.
"The Historian" is an epic work of historical fiction that sweeps across Europe during the four decades between 1930 and the mid 1970s. It just also happens to involve the Dracula myth and a good dose of suspense. Now, some people may object to me calling this novel a work of historical fiction because it is mostly fiction and contains very few real characters. That is true, but Kostova does such an amazing job of making the Dracula myths come alive that you can't help feeling that the legends and the story are real. Her research is stunning in its attention to detail and the wide range of topics Kostova must've studied. A previous reviewer slightly criticizes Kostova for spending too many pages describing the pilgrimage routes of monks hundreds of years ago. While sections like that do slow down the pace of the novel somewhat, they don't distract from it. The last book that I read that combines elements of history, suspense, and great characters as well as "The Historian" was "The Devil in the White City".
Highly recommended!
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135 of 160 people found the following review helpful:
Long on prose poems, short on character, plot, logic and sense., September 20, 2005
If you've got the remotest affection for Europe, for medieval ruins, for the romance of travel and history, it's easy to fall right in love with _The Historian_. Whatever her shortcomings, Ms. Kostova has a genuine knack for evoking the way the light at sunset hits the crumbling stone towers of the monastery just _so_ as the farmers are bringing in their animals and the smoke from the cooking stoves goes wafting by. This, and the glimmer of an interesting idea--someone secretly distributing antique books to university historians, entirely blank but for a single woodcut image of a dragon and the word "DRAKULYA"--were enough to get me at least a hundred pages into the book before I started to realize that there just wasn't any meat to the story.
Dracula, it seems, has kidnapped a kindly old professor--the recipient of one of those old books--and so a student of his sets off to search for the tomb in which Dracula was buried some 500 years ago, because even though he has moved freely across continents and oceans for centuries, that is where he just _has_ to be.
So the travelogue begins, city to city, castle to monastery, library to mosque, confusing movement with progress-- England, France, Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary...and perhaps we should be thankful that, with all the sightseeing, the plot scarcely ever has a chance to make an appearance, because it seems mostly to consist of contrivances and chance meetings that even a Victorian like Bram Stoker would have blushed at. That woman checking out Stoker's _Dracula_ in the library just as the professor's student is starting his research? The professor's long-lost daughter, of course. The Turkish fellow sitting down to dinner at the next table? A lifelong Dracula fanatic and amateur historian, of course. And his English is excellent on account of his day job as a professor of English Lit. The English historian at a random academic conference in Budapest that our heroes attend as a cover-story to score visas to Hungary? The proud recipient of yet another of those antique dragon-books. And so it goes, random meeting after chance discovery after remarkable happenstance. Nothing in the plot is organic, nothing evolves according to any kind of logic or necessity: we are only going down a list of bullet points in the author's notebook, one after another, because that is how the plot _needs_ to go in order to take us next to that incredible castle in the mountains where the wind whistles just _so_ through the mossy cracks in the stonework...
...until after about 600 pages of this nonsense, we finally pry apart the gravestones (duly pausing to note how the dust of the centuries has settled just _so_ on the fading inscriptions of the musty crypt) and learn the terrible truth of Dracula's horrible plan for the professor, to--Dun-Dun-DUUUUNNN!--CATLOG HIS LIBRARY! (As Dave Barry would say, I swear I am not making this up.) As it turns out, the Prince of the Undead is a bit of a bookworm. Who knew?
But of course, we should have been able to guess. _Everyone_ in this novel is a bookworm, for the same reason that everyone acts the same, thinks the same, and talks the same: because everyone in this novel is essentially one character, the author herself. Romanian peasant, Turkish professor, expat teenager--read a line of dialogue at random, and you'd never be able to guess who is who. When you pick up the book, it is often a bit confusing to figure out where you are, not because there are so many narrators, but because there are so few _voices_. One imagines the author perhaps putting on now a pair of Groucho glasses, now a fez, now tying a kerchief around her hair, as she evokes one character or another, but the writing never changes. Neither do the characters themselves--the protagonists are all secular, rational people, who, when they find themselves in a vampire story, simply shrug and reach for a crucifix and a silver bullet. What they are experiencing--what they are _doing_, in picking up that crucifix--and what it might mean to their deepest senses of what the world is and how it works...these are subjects that are never touched upon. Heaven knows, an author with a certain curiosity about character and psychology, to say nothing about metaphysics, might have spun a wonderful novel out of this material. But psychology and character didn't seem to make it on to those shopping lists of cities to visit and people to meet that define the plodding bulk of this book.
Even Dracula's little hobby of distributing those dragon books to young historians to rouse their curiosity, then trying to kill them if they actually start to do research on them, might have become a window into a vain and endlessly bored mind, giving himself a little thrill to while away the centuries. Here, it's just another illogical plot contrivance, vanishing into the swarming multitudes of its fellows.
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37 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
The Dracula legend, minus all the good parts, July 13, 2005
Given the raw materials that went into this book, it's surprising that Ms. Kostova wasn't able to make much out of it. Consider: the legend of Dracula, the historical figure of Vlad Tepes ("Vlad the Impaler"), the exotic settings of the Balkans and Istanbul, faded maps and secret societies. It all sounds very good, which is why The Historian seems like such a terrible waste of a good material.
Billed as the Next "Da Vinci Code," this book is anything but. Where the Da Vinci Code rushes from thrill to thrill, The Historian slowly walks from one unfulfilled promise to another. Many good plot devices and tantalizing story threads are simply abandoned when the novel comes to a close. One wonders if Ms. Kostova simply couldn't decide what to do with them and just gave up.
The narrative style is, at first, interesting: a series of recollections - one within another. However by the time that you are reading the recollection of a woman-as recalled by her lover--as recounted by his friend--- as recorded by his daughter, you really lose patience with this device.
Worse, Kostova believes that character development is best done in a rush, with the character recounting their life story from birth - usually in response to someone saying "Hello." As in, "Hello, where might I find..?" "I was born in a small town, my parents were very poor and..." Characters in this book go on and on about themselves as if they knew someone would be writing down their every word. Unfortunately for us, someone did.
The author has clearly done a great deal of research about her setting, and positioning a hunt for Dracula in the Cold War Balkans is very compelling. The gradual beginning of the story is very stylized, and could have grown into a satisfying mystery.
Any sense of mystery is undone by the countless times a revelation is promised, and then fails to arrive. A document is found that might tell us everything - but the good part is torn off. We are told of a man who could help us - but he's dead. About the fourth or fifth time this happens, the reader starts to greet each new clue with theories on how it will ultimately come to nothing. Even more maddening are those times when a new character promises to reveal a great deal, then proceeds to recount their life story for half a chapter before revealing that the protagonists really need to talk to someone else.
I don't want to come off like a crank - I sincerely tried to like this book, and I read all of it. However the glacial pace, the absence of any real tension, and the bizarrely matter-of-fact portrayal of the fiend at the center of the story was too disappointing.
This book promises a lot, but it fails to deliver in almost every respect.
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44 of 53 people found the following review helpful:
Rife with improbable coincidences and lame plot, May 27, 2006
The Historian is rife with incredible coincidences and unbelievable plot twists, which I am about to describe - so major plot spoilers are in the forth coming paragraphs - if you are going to ignore my advice and read this woeful book, better stop reading this review.
At the beginning of novel, Rossi relates that he is examining ancient documents in Turkey, when he reads aloud "...say his name, and he will be there - Dracula!" Suddenly, a mysterious stranger enters the room, and warns Rossi to stop his research. My goodness, Dracula is alive! And he can be summoned simply by saying his name! But when Paul & Helen are in Turkey, reading a similar document, and someone speaks Dracula's name, it isn't Dracula who appears but the pseudo-vampire, the unnamed Librarian who wants to find Dracula's tomb. Later, Helen spends almost 20 years searching for clues to find where Dracula is hiding so she can confront and kill him - so why doesn't Helen just speak his name, and he will be there?
Dracula has printed up 1450 blank books, these books contain nothing but a crude map and the a woodcut with the word Dracula. He has passed these 1450 books out to libraries and scholars, hoping one of them will find his tomb. Yes, Dracula wants to be found, because that will prove the determined scholar is worthy
of being Dracula's librarian. For 500 years, Dracula has been living in his tomb, reading books, longing for a librarian.
But no one has made it to the tomb. Perhaps after the first couple hundred years without a librarian, Dracula might realize
that his strategy isn't working, and he ought to try something else? Or maybe he would realize that he has gone without a
librarian for a few hundred years, so maybe he doesn't need on after all? And why is he spending all this time in his
mouldering tomb reading books, we learn that Dracula has grown strong enough that he can spend time out in direct sunlight.
So why doesn't Dracula go out and DO something?
Despite the fact Dracula wants a librarian to find his tomb, he actively discourages any one from succeeding. Indeed, when Rossi has been investigating in Romania, he learns some clues, and falls in love. But Rossi has to go to Greece for research, and while in Greece, a mysterious stranger (guess who) shows up and hands Rossi a drink named "Amnesia" - which Rossi drinks, and he promptly forgets everything that happened in Romania! (We find out about Rossi's time in Romania because he conveniently wrote letters describing what he learned, but of course he never mailed these letters.) Rossi remember drinking Amnesia, but he forgets everything about Romania. Why exactly is Dracula doing this?
Apparently Dracula is frustrated that no one can figure out how to find his tomb and become his librarian, so he appears at the college where Rossi works and abducts him. When Rossi wakes up in the tomb, Dracula confesses his diabolical plan to leave blank books around the libraries of the world to lure a suitable scholar to his tomb. Rossi protests: "But I didn't find your tomb, you brought me here!" Dracula ignores this valid complaint. "Now that I have explained my evil plan, let us read!" And so we are treated to ludicrious scene where Rossi and Dracula are quietly reading ancient old books in a tomb! (But not until after Rossi has a fine meal underground. Where does this magical dinner come from? Why does an undead vampire need room service? No one else has been in his tomb for 500 years, so it isn't like he is used to entertaining visitors.)
Why does Dracula print up only 1450 of his blank books? Because that was the year the Ottomans took over his kingdom. But we learn in a different part of the book that people in that part of the world dated their calendars from the time of the Great Flood, because all of Brother Kiril's letters are dated something like 6540. If the monks of that era are using an archaic calendar,
why isn't Dracula? He ought to have printed 6540 blank books!
Rossi has an assistant, Paul, who is actually the main character of this story. Paul realizes he must find the tomb of Dracula so he can rescue him. Because if Rossi is bitten three times, he will be turned into a vampire himself! It takes months for Paul to finally reach Rossi, and yet Dracula still hasn't gotten around to administering the third bite. Nevertheless, Paul drives
a stake through Rossi's heart any way! I was confused by this. The whole issue of being needing three bites to turn into a vampire is not applied consistently in the Historian. For example, the unnamed librarian, who is a pseudo vampire, has apparently only been bitten once. Yet this librarian bites Helen, even though he is not yet a vampire himself! Then he gets hit by car, which kills him, except he is apparently already undead,
because he shows up again later in the novel. But when he does show up again, he is much stronger, "because apparently he has been bitten a second time!". Helen gets bitten a second time, but she doesn't turn into a vampire. (Helen has been wearing a crucifix, but apparently the chain broke in her sleep and it fell off on the exact night when Dracula decides to show up and haunt her! How inconvenient!) (Despite the fact Dracula can now move around in the sunlight, he is still afraid of a crucifix. We know this because he hides his face behind a newspaper when confronting Paul's daughter, who is wearing a crucifix around her neck.)
Every where Paul and Helen go, they meet someone who has also found one of Dracula's blank books. Attend a conference in Romania and talk to a Scottish professor - coincidentally, he also has one of those books! Stop at a monastary in Bulgaria? Yes, they have one there too! Stop for dinner at a restaurant in Constantinople? A stranger sits down at their table who also received a book! What a coincidence - even the characters in the remark on how extraordinary this coincidence is. Even better, the guy in the restaurant turns out to be a member of a super secret order of Turkish Vampire Fighters! These Turkish vampire fighters never reveal their existence to anyone, but he tells Paul "... because you guessed!" Paul: "No I didn't!" Turkish guy: "Well, I have to reveal my membership in this ultra secret society so that I can give you the 200,000 lira you need to bribe your way into Bulgaria." How convenient! Also convenient, Helen has an aunt who is an authority in Romania and can get Paul and Helen in to that country.
There is lots of more: Helen throws herself off a cliff to elude Dracula, only to fall a mere 15 feet and escape without harm, and Dracula can't be bothered to see where she lands. Dracula presumes she is dead, yet Helen lives in fear of him in the following years - why? At the end of the novel, why does Master James suddenly appear - only to distract Dracula so Helen can fire? Talk about a deus ex machina!
I have not exhausted the stupid plot twists in this horrible novel, but I am tired of writing about it. Avoid this huge bloated book at all costs. There are plenty of other good books in the world. Pick up one of the good ones, and let's join Dracula in his tomb: "Let us read - but not the Historian!"
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19 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
It's Alive!, September 21, 2005
Oh, I wanted to love Ms. Kostova's novel. A long, engrossing story is my idea of heaven and I thoroughly disagree that the long novel is an anachronism in the screen-to-face era we live in. And if the long novel is able to blend beautiful description, historical flavor, and a gripping story, well...nirvana.
The story began slowly, and I was willing to hang in there, waiting for the "real story" to kick in. And I read, and I read, and I read. Each time Kostova would drop some penurious tidbit of actual vampire activity on the page, I would limp along. As many of my reviewing colleagues have stated, it was at approximately page 300 that I did something I NEVER do when reading a novel--I started skimming for the story.
Where was the editor? Why was so much research allowed to be dumped directly onto the page instead of giving the reader a distillation that does what a novel is supposed to do: TELL ME A STORY. If I want to read straight history or travelogue (both of which I enjoy a great deal, by the way), I will go to a different part of the bookstore.
Perhaps Ms. Kostova has been so long in the world of academia that she has confused dissertation with storytelling. I bought this book at 30% off and feel that I was snookered.
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27 of 36 people found the following review helpful:
My dear and unfortunate reader...., June 16, 2005
For once, a novel that is not horror or all blood and gore, but a truely facinating and suspensful tale that kept me awake after reading only 64 pages of it. I am not faint-hearted, nor have I ever been kept awake by any books. This novel facinated me and made me want to finish it in one sitting.
Drakulya-Dracula-Vlad Tepes-whatever you want to call him is not the main character in this book, but a father and daughter historian team who are searching for him within the secrets of history. Since I have extensive knowledge of Vlad/Dracula and the events surrounding his life, I was blown away by this novel and how much more I was able to learn.
Creepy and eerie, this novel haunts the reader by making its point very clear-the reader has all the power in the world, bringing a tale to life. Without someone to read this book, there is no power to this story. Within these pages is contained one of the most engrossing and imaginative tales that brings the reader to feel as though they have been inducted into a secret society. I actually feared for my life while reading this book, simply because I felt as though I WAS one of the characters.
This novel starts off a bit slowly, without suspense or terror, but quickly gains steam as the story unfolds before the reader's eyes.
The Historian brings together a classic tale of gothic suspense and terror, but without the usual blood spilled in every chapter.
Yours with profoundest grief-
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