Stoker’s Wilde West by Steven Hopstaken and Melissa Prusi
My Five Word TL:DR Review – A series I am loving
This series is so very good. I’m thoroughly enjoying it. See my review for Stoker’s Wilde here and also I must give a little shout out to Pages and Tea who first brought this series to my attention – thank you so much you lovely person you.
So, this second instalment largely follows the mode of storytelling set out in book No.1, diary excerpts, journals, field reports, telegrams, etc. The epistolary style is something I love and to recreate it here, with such style and panache is a real work of genius. This is a series full of characters and references that I simply adore and so, I’m not going to lie, I was pretty much bowled over by both books.
What differs with this particular instalment is that the authors take us out of Victorian England and into America and the Wild West and the change in setting is fantastic and inspired. We have cowboys, gold diggers, gunslingers and a host of familiar names, not least of which is Calamity Jane.
I won’t over elaborate on the plot. There are of course vampires and dastardly deeds which involve certain people trying to open the doors between the realms, and there is plenty of action, jumping off cliffs and traversing the country on horseback or train. Suffice to say -highly entertaining.
Again we have Stoker and Wilde, Florence and in this instalment the addition of a couple of other voices that add to the story.
As with the first, I think Oscar really shines, I love his diary inserts and his show stealing ways. He’s so outrageously and delightfully flamboyant. Stoker completely manages to downplay this by being so downright no nonsense, in much the same way as the first book, and of course Florence also plays a much bigger part in this story and I really enjoyed her scenes and character growth. I think the three are really growing in terms of friendship and strength and I can’t wait to see what they get up to next.
I also love the way that both stories are interspersed with real facts and events, such as Oscar touring America or Stoker taking his theatre company there.
The writing is, again, perfection. I love the voices of the two main characters and they makes me long for more and more adventures. They manage to get themselves into such outrageous situations where death feels like a real possibility, but at the same time, you know something or someone will save the day.
In terms of criticisms. Well, I think this one meandered slightly and also there are quite a few plot lines coming into play in the early pages – I mention this simply to make readers aware as I personally didn’t find this problematic at all.
Overall, I just love this series. If my arm was twisted and I was hard pressed to choose a favourite I would say the first book stole my heart. That being said, this book was incredibly enjoyable.
I receive a copy through Netgalley, courtesy of the author, for which my thanks. The above is my own opinion.
My rating 4.5 of 5 stars
Stoker’s Wilde by Steven Hopstaken and Melissa Prusi
17 August 2020
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Melissa Prusi, Steven Hopstaken, Stoker's Wilde
“The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what Fiction means.”
My five word TL:DR review: Absolutely brilliant, witty, gothic horror
I loved this book. Quite simply it is perfection and, if like me, you enjoy a good epistolary style novel set in the Victorian era that is a reimagining of the lives of Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde and creates an adventure that could be said to have inspired two literary masterpieces (if you believe in the supernatural that is), then give this one a try. I adored this and couldn’t put it down and my next book will certainly be Stoker’s Wilde West.
Why this book worked so well for me.
Well, I love a story told in the form of diary excerpts and letters and this is done particularly well here. I enjoy the feeling of being in the ‘moment’ which this style helps to create and in this particular instance a much broader picture is provided by including more than one POV.
This is a fantastic tale of werewolves and vampires and a dastardly tale of horror inspired by the search for immortality. It reads in parts very much like one of the Penny Dreadfuls of the era and I thought that was a particularly inspired touch. There is horror here, the kind of no nonsense horror where basically people die at the hands of the supernatural and in turn the supernatural are shot with silver or staked with the ensuing messy piles of ashes and exploding goo that you might expect – and yet this doesn’t feel grim or bloody because the story is tempered by the two primary povs, Wilde being sharply witty and Stoker steadfastly pragmatic.
That’s another element of the book that I loved. The begrudging friendship of the two lead characters. They’re so very different in every way imaginable and a pair of less likely friends is difficult to imagine. As it is, necessity being the mother of survival the two, thankfully, do team up and deliver a dashing adventure of unlikely heroes.
The other thing of beauty here is the different voices. Sometimes a novel with alternating voices can fail simply because they sound too similar. That’s not a criticism that can be levelled at this book. I loved all the different povs that make up this story but I confess that Oscar stole the show a little for me and I’m not sure, being a joint undertaking, whether one author was responsible for one character each – but, whatever the method used it worked incredibly well and the two characters could be described as something like chalk and cheese.
Now, I have read a couple of Oscar Wilde’s works and also loved Stoker’s Dracula and for me this novel captures their voices and style really well – but, I also admit that I’m no expert, I haven’t scrutinised this to the nth degree and so if you are an aficionado you might find things that you disagree with. That didn’t happen for me in fact all the little tidbits here, particularly concerning Stoker, fed into or seemed to work alongside some of the other retellings I’ve read and I absolutely loved that the story was a strangely alternate mash up of both Dracula and Dorian Gray.
In terms of criticisms. I have nothing at all to be honest, however, I would reiterate that this is a tale told through letters, diaries and the like so if that isn’t your cup of tea then take heed. Also, given the nature of the story and the characters depicted there is a certain tone and style of writing that reflects the era – again, I thought it worked beautifully but again, this isn’t written in a contemporary style so again, take note.
Overall, I loved this and like Oliver – I want more please. Fortunately, and being late to the party with this one – the second book is ready and waiting. I can’t wait to dive into the pages of Stoker’s Wilde West. Mmm, delicious expectation.
I bought a copy. The above is my own opinion.
5 of 5 stars
Books and travelling with Lynn 