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Post by dem bones on Sept 7, 2017 5:39:40 GMT
Philip Daniels - The Dracula Murders (Lorevan, 1986: originally Robert Hale, 1983) Blurb: The Festival of Horror Ball at the country club was a great success, with everyone dressed as vampires, werewolves and assorted monsters.
The fun was interrupted by a spectral figure calling himself Nosferatu, who warned the merrymakers they were tampering with the unknown.
People dismissed him as a crank, until a girl was ritualistically murdered on the golf course.
Superintendent Vine took charge of what one national paper called THE DRACULA MURDERS.
There were further murders, and the Dracula label stuck. The authorities summoned Professor Cornfeld, expert on Eastern European history.
Vine stuck to the police routine, but Cornfeld looked outside. He set out to track down Nosferatu.
A bizarre bargain was struck.
A bargain between the living and the Undead. When a creepy stage invader grabs the mic, everyone assumes he's tonight's cabaret, none of them having previously experienced Le Fanu the Magnificent's act. But this Nosferatu guy is no mere conjurer. He is exactly who he says he is, and the Council he represents - the Council of the Undead - are furious at such a travesty as tonight's Horror Ball. Fools! Don't they realise they are meddling with things better left alone? Well really! A joke's a joke, but this is going too far! Mindful that Mr. Scary is upsetting the ladies, John Matthews - "Good old John. Trust John to know what to do." etc. - rounds up a couple of chaps, and the gatecrasher is escorted from the stage mid-bore allowing Sidney Paget's Original Foxtrot Orchestra to continue their set with a rousing Everybody Stomp. Not for the first time, Paul Carter, secretary of the Entertainment committee, is tremendously pleased with himself. Bar that rum business with the gatecrasher, the event has proved a social and financial triumph. New to Great Bravington, he privately regards the village as his personal fiefdom in waiting. Status is a big deal with Carter. He hates whenever a local has the temerity to reminisce on non-events prior to what is sure to go down in history as the 'Carter' epoch. Tonight's shindig was his brainchild right down to the exorbitant, riff-raff deterring price of admission. He must have words with the acting doorman, George Spinks, about his responsibilities, but no harm done .... ... until young Woodley of the local rugger XV crashes in from the garden blabbering some fool nonsense about a murder! Superintendent Vine of the local Wessex police is not best pleased at being roused from his bed at this unearthly hour, but at least this looks like an open and shut case. The victim, Elizabeth Warren, nineteen, died from a single stab wound. Her boyfriend, Tony Benson fled the scene only to drive into a tree. He too is deceased. The pathologist bears bad tidings. Elizabeth was attacked with an arrow. Unless Tony carried one about his person, he's not the culprit. She's also been bitten on the neck, forcibly enough to draw blood. Maybe they ought to track down this "Nosferatu" clown everyone is raving about. There is no need. Nosferatu arrives at the station the very next day offering his assistance. Vine can't know it (but we readers do) that there's a madman on the loose who believes himself "Dracula: Prince of Darkness" and seeks his lost "Lucy." The Vampires want him stopped before he gives their order a bad name. First read this a decade ago, wasn't especially impressed at the time, but quite enjoying it the second time around if only for it's Midsummer Murders vibe (i.e., a lack of sympathetic character to root for). It's doubtful that even the late Sir C. Lee, who raised depictions of the pompous, humourless bore to something of an art form, could do justice to this version of Nosferatu.
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Post by dem bones on Sept 8, 2017 6:30:07 GMT
Vine and Inspector Cornwall have taken multiple witness statements, heard all about the "corpse-like ghoul" whose outburst caused such a scene. To see him in the clammy flesh is to realise the Great Bravington elite were not exaggerating. Why should he want to help? Because the killer has blasphemed. The Day of Blackness draws near. Soon the Master, Vlad Tepes: Dracula, Prince Of Darkness will return to claim his kingdom. The tormented maniac who did for Liz believes himself the reincarnation Vlad. The truth is, he's not even a vampire. He must pay for taking the Master's name in vain.
Meanwhile, George Spinks, the caretaker turned doorman for a night, is blurting out his story to Bill Wallington of The Daily Chronicle. George is adamant that the skeletal stranger killed Liz because only a weirdoe could do a thing like that and everyone in the village is normal. George provides chapter and verse on the murder weapon, the bite marks, the lot. Wallington has his shock! horror! headline: The Dracula Murders. The Chronicle have their exclusive.
When the coroner confirms that Liz was, in fact, poisoned, The Chronicle is a laughing stock. Wallington is carpeted by his editor.
#
Now we're in the Crypt, Manchester, sharing a swift ginger ale with working girls Edie and Sandra. Gossip centres around Irish Mollie's mark for the evening. Proper gent, he is. Bought them all a drink. A Johnny Foreigner, but you take the rough with the smooth in this game. Goes by the name of Vlad.
Sue Duncan, Doctor's receptionist, is readying herself for tonight's theatre date. Husband Donald is a changed man since his expedition to the South American swamps where he contracted a blood-wasting disease. He'd have died were it not for the ministrations of Devil-Worshipping tribesmen. Skeletal as he now is, Donald is increasingly prone to violent outbursts until Sue is terrified of the man she once adored. At least she no longer has to share his bed, Donald having lost all interest in that sort of thing and moved into the spare room which he's painted black. Donald good as entombs himself in there for days and nights on end. His wife is denied access. Sue only knows about the altar and scary books on vampire lore because she climbed a ladder and had a nosey through the window when he was out. Recently Donald ditched his career in chemical research to take a mystery job in Manchester in partnership with a Mr. V. A. Dalrimple. His long absences from home have granted Sue a new lease of sex life. Everything would be bliss were it not for the constant fear of getting caught ...
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Post by helrunar on Sept 8, 2017 14:50:02 GMT
This one sounds like a real riot. Thanks again for a few much-needed laughs, Dem!
Dem, Prince of Darkness... it has a ring to it...
cheers, H.
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Post by dem bones on Sept 10, 2017 8:16:26 GMT
Bollocks! I already "reviewed" this circa a century ago. What a double waste of everyone's time. Will just have to see if I can make this one even more wretched than version #1. This one sounds like a real riot. Thanks again for a few much-needed laughs, Dem! is an easy read, that's for sure. Despite the vampire trappings, it's more crime thriller than horror story. Having a fondness for the fancy dress party setting, horror-themed or otherwise, the opening chapter went down especially well. Anyway ... We were rightly concerned for the safety of Sue Duncan and Irish Mollie. Sue never did get to bed her Aussie hunk, killed outright when their car was mangled in a head on collision with a coach. Sue escaped with concussion and minor injuries, but the far reaching consequences of her infidelity could prove fatal. Her only hope is that scary husband is by now so disinterested in her well-being that he couldn't care what she gets up to while he's away seeking his 'Lucy.' Irish Mollie fares even worse. Poisoned, impaled and bitten in identical fashion to Liz, except this time the killer adds insult to fatal injury. "The murderer had made some unsuccessful attempt at intercourse with the dead woman. The attempt was made after the woman was dead." Either Vlad hasn't got this prostitute thing figured or he's a bad head for business. Deputy Chief Constable 'Happy' Appleton summons Vine to a powwow with Chief Super Charlie Grayce (Mancunian counterpart), and Professor Cornfield, a celebrity expert in European history, specialist subjects vampires and werewolves, the weird bastard. Grayce is adamant the man they seek is a bent doctor or chemist. Vine agrees though privately doubts it. He has an advantage over his colleague in that he's gone face to skull with Nosferatu. While it's "not very manly" to admit as much, even to himself, the fellow made his flesh creep. In the wake of the second murder, Bill Wallington of The Chronicle, is re-instated as chief reporter. Maybe he was right all along! Either way this 'Dracula Murders' business has a neat ring to it, should shift a few copies. Wallington travels north to the Crypt to interview Mollie's fellow hookers on an all-expenses. 70 pages (of 190) to go. |
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Post by dem bones on Sept 12, 2017 19:54:34 GMT
 Cover of the Robert Hale edition, 1983. Well that was all very painless. Mr. Daniels takes the closing chapters at a fair belt and any stragglers among the cast are left behind. We never get to discover how superhack Bill Wallington fares at the Crypt - he simply drops out of the story without bye or leave, likewise all who attended the Horror Ball. Even Nosferatu is rarely around. The author is a bit mean with the murders - four in all, two of them off page - and the penultimate revelation, while not exactly a cheat, is a groan-inducer of Night Of The Ripper proportion. While not a patch on that other 190 pages of Bogus-Dracula-on-the-rampage thrills, The Dead Travel Fast (Superintendent Vine lacks Marcus Odibiah's electric personality), I had a far better time with The Dracula Murders than grouchy excuse for a review suggests. It's way preferable to the proliferation of bloated vampire block-busters that were doing the rounds throughout the '80's & '90's, that's for sure. |
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