46 books like Dracula Park

I can’t get enough of this supernatural classic, which is made all the more vivid by the way its story unfolds through letters, telegrams, diary entries, and newspaper clippings. It is the found-footage horror story of its era.

Like Frankenstein, it has been adapted hundreds of times, officially and unofficially, into nearly every medium, yet the original novel is unparalleled for holding the reader in its icy grip. Stoker brought his own fears to the page, and I am always surprised at how, in just a few pages, they become my fears, as well.

This book has engendered controversy for almost forcefully bridging the gap between the 15th Century Wallachian Prince Vlad III or Vlad the Impaler or Dracula. Stoker had already constructed his character, called “Count Wampyr,” before he learned of his future namesake. However, he quite clearly establishes a connection between the two through an explanation provided by Abraham Van Helsing. The Dracula of the eponymous novel is a heavily fictionalized version of the real-life figure, but so are most similarly positioned characters in literature, film, and television. Florescu and McNally provide a cursory overview of Slavic and Balkan vampire folklore, a biographical sketch of Vlad the Impaler, and illuminate the process by which Stoker adapted this violent, cunning, and sometimes brilliant nationalist and military tactician into a fictional monster.

This is a really thorough, fascinating encyclopedia of all things vampire––from folklore to nineteenth-century literature to obscure religious movements to comic books and movies to true crime. Whatever you want to know about vampires, this book will have it or tell you where you can find it. J. Gordon Melton is a total fanatic when it comes to vampire lore and he encouraged me early on when I first began researching the vampire community. Besides vampires, Melton loves to collect obscure information and data on all manner of religious groups. He once described himself to me as “a very greedy scholar” because there are so many topics that he tracks and researches. He can also tell you the best used bookstores in any city in America.  

A must-have for everyone who wants to learn about Dracula. In short chapters and with humorous language, Miller wipes the floor with all authors who never cared to do their homework and have been spreading misunderstandings about Stoker’s epochal novel. Taken altogether, it outlines what I would call the “Millerian paradigm,” claiming that as an author of fiction, Stoker was not bound to historical or geographical accuracy, and may have messed up a detail or two. By now, I have demonstrated that Stoker was more precise than Miller believed, and have worded a new paradigm focusing on the “Paradox of Fact and Fiction” Stoker was caught in. But we all stand on the shoulders of giants, and Elizabeth Miller was the most important of them.

After Bram Stoker and Vlad the Impaler, the real person most closely associated with vampires has to be Bela Lugosi—so why not write a horror novel with him as the villain? This book underscores the important role that unsettling and dramatic occurrences can play in shaking us out of our own accustomed vices, as well as the difficulty we often face when trying to discern the difference between the works of evil and the truly mundane. After all, Bela Lugosi is nothing more than a tired, sad old man still pining for his glory days on the silver screen—isn’t he?

A controversial author who I discovered in my twenties; I lapped up his non-fictional work.

This book is an in-depth investigation into the dark side of the human psyche. Wilson explores the psychology and history of criminality and violence, concluding with how that is manifested in what was then his ‘present day’.

Although first published in 1984, nearly forty years on his work is still pertinent. For me that stimulates many questions. Having just pulled it from my bookshelf, I think it is time I read it again.

Wilson covers his subject with focused attention and easy-to-understand detail. He encourages the reader to think about human existence from many perspectives. 

Lada is the daughter of Vlad Tepes (the inspiration for Stoker’s Dracula), Vovoide of Wallachia who, along with her brother, Radu, are sent as hostages to the Ottoman court of Sultan Murad II.

I loved the protagonist, Lada, who preferred war and combat to being a traditional ‘lady’ of the court.

Through Lada’s eyes, I got to witness her life as a noble in Wallachia and then, as a fish out of water, in the eastern world of the Muslim Ottomans which was opulent and exotic.

And I Darken appealed to me as I could relate to Lada, having to live in a foreign culture. As an Asian growing up in London, I lived in two worlds – my family’s and the UK's.

The whole storyline is unique.

It’s not a typical paranormal romance, it’s a vampire book without it. It’s well written, and I love how the author takes the reader on a journey around the world not based in one location.

There is suspense but with a historical factor driving it and that’s what makes it such a unique book.

I definitely recommend this book for the audience who is steering away from the paranormal romance tropes and wants to sit down to read a unique book. 

This book jumped out at me at a bookstore one day, and I loved it so deeply that I sought out the author when I learned he lived nearly and we became good friends.

Rubinstein stumbled upon a true crime story most reporters only dream of – that of hard-drinking third-string Hungarian hockey goalie Attila Ambrus, who took up bank robbing and triggered the largest manhunt in post-communist Eastern European history – and then was smart enough to let the story tell itself, bit by incredible bit.

The result is a wild ride through the chaos of post-Cold War Hungary with a rambunctious antihero for whom you can’t help but root.

Romania is not all Dracula and Olympic gymnasts. For example, did you know the original Tarzan, Johnny Weissmuller, was an ethnic Saxon from Transylvania? 

During my time in Romania, I found her people bright and engaging. Simmer that in the melting pot of a turbulent multi-cultural history formed at a crossroads between powerful empires and it’s no surprise that the result is great insight, resilience, and wisdom. However, Romania’s minority language and time as a secretive Soviet state conspire to ensure their worldview has not been shared widely. 

Besides introducing some famous names whom you might not associate with Romania, this book is genuinely inspirational and captures the country’s spirit, humour, and culture.