Was very intrigued the other day when a student from Italy contacted me and requested permission to use Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula: the Adventure of the Solitary Grave in her dissertation. She very kindly sent me a translation (as I don't read Italian, sadly). It had some very kind and interesting things to say.
Here's a spoiler-free excerpt: (in English)
--Christian Klaver is an American writer of short stories of science and fantasy fiction, who published a collection of short stories entitled The Supernatural Casefiles of Sherlock Holmes. The adventure that I analyzed is a pleasant reading and the book was well received by critics and people in the web. The American author Amy Sturgis considers it "an unexpectedly rich and satisfying Sherlock Holmes-meets-Count Dracula tale" and blogger Suzanne Lazear, specializing in Holmesian pastiche, writes: "This blending of two major Victorian characters is written in a style so seamless you can almost believe it was found in the attic of one of Doyle’s editors".
--The narrator John Watson goes with the reader through the streets of Victorian London in a short novel that hits the mark. [Edit: a longish short-story might be a better term.]
--Through an intense writing, Watson addresses the reader from the first line of the novel and gives him a share of his emotions
-- The main conflict is between the irrationality of the vampirism and the rationality embodied by Dr. Watson and Holmes
I'll include the full dissertation, but it's spoilerriffic, for those that don't want to know the plot yet. You can contact Maria Cristina Tamagnini at mcristinatamagnini@hotmail.it
Thanks again, Maria, for the kind words!
