The Historian Review

I finished the 642 page The Historian last night around 1am. I don't know if I couldn't sleep because I wanted to finish the book, but for whatever reason, I tossed and turned for an hour before deciding to get up and just finish the last 30 pages. It was a long slog to make it through this book. At times, it drags a little. It starts out with the narrator switching between her father telling her his story, and her telling the readers what is happening in the present. It's an interesting way to work in first person narration with several characters (A Long Way Down offered another). Eventually though, we are expected to believe that her father wrote out the rest of his story in a really really long letter to her. It takes a little getting used to the quotation marks at the beginning of every paragraph, but it didn't really get in the way too much.
But I digress, enough about the writing style, on with the content. Various historians keep finding these mysterious books planted in their workspaces, which leads each of them to research Dracula, the myth, the legend. It turns out that Dracula is a bit of a (an?) historian himself. I liked that the book was "smart", and that I didn't feel like every single little thing was being explained to me (like I think The DaVinci Code did too often). I was a little disappointed with the climactic scene, but not with the ending itself. Recommended, but make sure you have the time to read 600+ pages.
Also, this week is "Banned Books Week." It's worth checking out the list and picking up one of the books to read. I did that a couple of years ago and really enjoyed the books I read. You'd be surprised what people don't want your kids to read.