Night Crawler
20-06-2008, 12:21 AM
The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova
Published 2005 by Little, Brown and Company
Time Warner Book Group
I came across this book on the bargain table of a local bookstore the other day. Happily, I had time to kill waiting for a prescription to be filled - otherwise I would not normally have stopped to peruse this particular book based on it’s too bland cover and subject matter. I read the synopsis and glanced through it, checking out the quality and style of writing. Still, it did not really grab my attention, but I thought what the heck? It’s on sale for a measly few buck so I haven’t lost much if I don’t like it after closer inspection.
So glad I did! I brought it home and dumped it with a stack of other books and then forgot it. But then this morning I spotted it and felt the need to give it at least a cursory read through. I am only a quarter of the way through and am very pleasantly surprised.
This is a fantasy fiction story and the author’s debut novel. Below are a couple of excerpts from the book:
Late on night, exploring her father’s library, a young woman finds an ancient book and a cache of letters. The letters are all addressed to “My dear and unfortunate successor,” and they plunge her into a world she never dreamed of - a labyrinth where the secrets of her father’s past and her mother’s mysterious fate connect to an inconceivable evil hidden in the depths of history.
The letters provide links to one of the darkest powers that humanity has ever known - and to a centuries long quest to find the source of that darkness and wipe it out. It is a quest for the truth about Vlad the Impaler, the medieval ruler whose barbarous reign formed the basis of the legend of Dracula.
My dear and unfortunate successor:
It is with regret that I imagine you, whoever you are, reading the account I must put down here. The regret is partly for myself - because I will surely be at least in trouble, maybe dead, or perhaps worse, if this is in your hands. But my regret is for you also, my yet-unknown friend, because only by someone who needs such vile information will this letter be read. If you are not my successor in some other sense, you will soon be my heir - and I feel sorrow at bequeathing to another human being my own, perhaps unbelievable, experience of evil. Why I myself inherited it I don’t know, but I hope to discover that fact, eventually - perhaps in the course of writing to you or perhaps in the course of further events…
As I’m not finished reading this yet, I can’t really give you a review. This is not usually my cup of tea genre, but thus far I am having trouble putting it down. It is told from the perspective of the girl, 36 years later, now a historian and is recounting events from memory and the documents she has acquired.
Cheers.
Published 2005 by Little, Brown and Company
Time Warner Book Group
I came across this book on the bargain table of a local bookstore the other day. Happily, I had time to kill waiting for a prescription to be filled - otherwise I would not normally have stopped to peruse this particular book based on it’s too bland cover and subject matter. I read the synopsis and glanced through it, checking out the quality and style of writing. Still, it did not really grab my attention, but I thought what the heck? It’s on sale for a measly few buck so I haven’t lost much if I don’t like it after closer inspection.
So glad I did! I brought it home and dumped it with a stack of other books and then forgot it. But then this morning I spotted it and felt the need to give it at least a cursory read through. I am only a quarter of the way through and am very pleasantly surprised.
This is a fantasy fiction story and the author’s debut novel. Below are a couple of excerpts from the book:
Late on night, exploring her father’s library, a young woman finds an ancient book and a cache of letters. The letters are all addressed to “My dear and unfortunate successor,” and they plunge her into a world she never dreamed of - a labyrinth where the secrets of her father’s past and her mother’s mysterious fate connect to an inconceivable evil hidden in the depths of history.
The letters provide links to one of the darkest powers that humanity has ever known - and to a centuries long quest to find the source of that darkness and wipe it out. It is a quest for the truth about Vlad the Impaler, the medieval ruler whose barbarous reign formed the basis of the legend of Dracula.
My dear and unfortunate successor:
It is with regret that I imagine you, whoever you are, reading the account I must put down here. The regret is partly for myself - because I will surely be at least in trouble, maybe dead, or perhaps worse, if this is in your hands. But my regret is for you also, my yet-unknown friend, because only by someone who needs such vile information will this letter be read. If you are not my successor in some other sense, you will soon be my heir - and I feel sorrow at bequeathing to another human being my own, perhaps unbelievable, experience of evil. Why I myself inherited it I don’t know, but I hope to discover that fact, eventually - perhaps in the course of writing to you or perhaps in the course of further events…
As I’m not finished reading this yet, I can’t really give you a review. This is not usually my cup of tea genre, but thus far I am having trouble putting it down. It is told from the perspective of the girl, 36 years later, now a historian and is recounting events from memory and the documents she has acquired.
Cheers.