Draculas- Crouch, Kilborn, Strand, Wilson

Many aspiring and experienced writers alike know of J.A. Konrath and his blog, A Newbie's Guide to Publishing. If you are a writer, or someone interested in epublishing, and you haven't visited his site yet, go, now... I'll wait.

Now that you're back, that site is how I found and virtualy met Konrath (aka Kilborn) who seems like a pretty nice guy. Because I've known him in the virtual world for a while (and even did an interview for his blog tour), I knew of the upcoming release of Draculas, a book written with three of Konrath's comrades and published exclusively electronically. I got an advanced copy, but ended up buying the book anyway because at $2.99, who cares if it's terrible. I waste more money on make up weekly. So, without further ado, here's my Draculas review. Which- FCC or whoever is in charge of making sure I don't take bribes for blogging reviews- I did get for free, but also purchased... so make of that what you will.

Crouch, Kilborn, Strand and Wilson are all excellent writers in their own right and when they collaborated they set out to write a serious horror novel and bring vampires back to the scary side of town. Overall, I think they succeeded. The book was pretty terrifying. Taking a page from Kilborn's Afraid, the book alternates between various points of view and is one long cannonball of a novel. It was exceptionall difficult to put down. I'll not spoil the plot here, but the very short summary is that a strange skull is found in an Eastern European farm field. The skull looks human, but has ridiculous fanged jaws that appear to unhinge like a snake's. A reclusive and near death millionaire purchases the skull, and well... mayhem ensues.

Now, I'll preface my opinion here by saying that I don't read much horror, so my thoughts on this particularly horrific book may be skewed. Overall, I did like the book. It was fast paced and well written. I couldn't tell where one author stopped and another began. The characters were believable and I liked the diversity of personalities. It was quite gory, but it worked, and didn't feel like too much given the gross situation. I did want more though. The book was short, at least I think it was, it's hard to tell length with an ebook. Regardless, I was a little diappointed when it ended. Granted they left it pretty open ended for a sequel, but I wanted more immediately. I liked the treatment of the vampires, no sparkles or dating teenages in this book. I think that it is well worth the price if you like horror or vampires at all.