Member Reviews
Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I really loved how this book was set up. It was fun reading chronologically and I felt like it gave a better understanding of the book’s events. The memes and comments from various contributors definitely added to the story. This book is best read with friends and I highly recommend getting a group together to go on the Dracula Daily journey with.
As someone who has read Dracula in the past, this is such a fun way to read this story! It made the classic story feel fresh in a way that I hadn't expected. I look forward to reading this again next year!
Reading Dracula in this format is so fun. I loved seeing the events exactly as they unfold and the memes/art/commentary really makes it so much fun and helps with understanding. I wish some other classics had the commentary like this, too!
Such a fun experience! Definitely recommend.
What an absolute delightful way to read such a classic tale. the side bar funny add in's had me cackling the entire time. I will be buying a copy for next years read through
I haven't finished the book yet - I'm reading along with the dates. But this is such a delight to read. Besides Bram Stoker's fascinating story, the art, the jokes, and the comments in the margins are so much fun. They bring a fun modern understanding and enhance the reading experience. I definitely recommend the book as an excellent and unique edition of a classic book.
What an incredibly fun way to read Stoker’s Dracula. I am a huge fan of annotated books, especially this one as it’s annotated by my fellow Tumblr users. It was as if I was reading it alongside others which was an interesting experience for me. As other reviewers have mentioned, I did expect more illustrations, but the funny comments were enough to satisfy my soul.
I really wish we had more versions of classic novels that are annotated with hilarious internet commentary and memes.
This was such a fun way to read Dracula, especially when reading it with.a book club! I loved how easily the diary entries were to follow, and that they were in chronological order so you can read it based on the actual date! I had no idea Dracula was an epistolary until this. This was a super approachable way to read a classic!
Great to have this in book form! I read Dracula daily through the email newsletter last year and loved the slow reveal of the story. This book includes comments and art from other contributors that all added to the online experience.
Compiling pop culture reactions and responses with a format that perfectly suits the epistolary style of the original Dracula, Matt Kirkland succeeds in creating a new experience for today's readers (and re-readers). The mixture of tweets, memes, and general commentary from over a century after its initial release captures a fascinating perspective of not only the horror and gothic genres, but also of how culture itself has grown and yet stayed the same.
So this is fun! I was introduced to Dracula Daily last year (however, I failed and stopped reading sometime around.. August?) and got the announcement in my inbox it was going to be a book. ?? What? How could they make a book out of something that was already a book, just rearranged in chronological order?
This is much more than "just Dracula, but in Chronological Order;" it's fully annotated with the sort of title descriptions you get when today's entry of Dracula (the novel) hits your inbox, along with comments from people who've read it over the last year or two as so many of us were, each day, fresh in the e-mail, a bunch of memes and jokes we shared with each other (or in my case, one friend put into the group chat like a meme sommelier).
This is honestly really cool, both as someone who was there when a lot of these jokes were dropping and I think anyone who is interested to read Dracula in the future but is intimidated by its age. It's not really hard to read as it is, but I think the occasional jokes and summaries of what is going on will help make it accessible too for people who may not be used to reading older language, are ESL, or who honestly just want to have a good time.
A fun and engaging way of (re)visiting this classic horror novel. I first read Dracula as a young teen because I was obsessed with the Universal Monster movies. I loved this way of (re)telling the story. It presents the whole plot in chronological order, but with memes and sarcastic comments in the margins that made me laugh out loud. I wasn't familiar with the Dracula Daily project before this, but I'm glad I discovered it.
It's a fair guess that you've heard of Dracula. You've probably seen a movie adaptation, and a smaller percentage of you will have read Bram Stoker's original novel. It's told in an epistolary style; that is, through a series of letters, telegrams, diary entries, and newspaper cuttings. The first entry happens on May 3rd, and in this book you are invited to read the entries 'in real time', following along with events in a strictly chronological order.
If you've never read the book, there are few enough changes here to 'count' (pun not intended!) as reading Dracula - it's a little bit of reordering, but no addition or removal of text. Well, that's not entirely true, as there is the addition of pithy commentary from the internet community, as Dracula Daily started life (or, undeath? ;)) as an email newsletter, and was picked up with enthusiasm by the Tumblr (in particular) community.
These are a really fun addition, imo. It's a serious book but a story that has entered the mainstream and that includes bad adaptations and parody. There's a joy to having these comments that both lighten the horror story, but are also so full of affection and genuine fondness, and only from that place can you add commentary that gently mocks and points out some of the lighter moments. For example, "Jonathan's like, 'everything here is very strange and upsetting but I'm far too British to make a fuss'." or, "Seward really is the protagonist of a mad scientist story who wandered into the wrong book." :)
These additions are a little like reading with a friend, or in a book group. If you've struggled with the text before, they might even help make it a little more accessible. My only real complaint about the book overall is that the comments are far to few, especially after the beginning. Would have loved a lot more!
If you have read the book, then this 'version' is an excellent way to indulge in a reread. As well as the internet comments and some amazing fan art, reading along with the timeline adds such a lot to following the characters' experience. It's one thing to know that Jonathan Harker goes quiet on his fiancée, Mina, for a stretch - and we the reader know why! - but it's entirely a different matter to put the book down for days, or over a week, waiting for events to come back to us. And, back to 'if you've struggled with it before' then having the story broken down into bite (yes, yes, vampire puns!) sized pieces is a great help.
I am a little bemused by the timing of publication, as to follow along you need to start in May. However, the bulk of the story does happen closer to the spooky season we're fast approaching, and this is a really fun way to bring a classic of the genre back to life ;)
Absolutely recommended: it's one of the pillars of horror for a reason (even if time and familiarity mean it's not that scary to a modern audience), and this has managed to find some 'value add' to the original text, without in any way taking from the original.
I love Bram Stoker’s Dracula. My husband and I read it together many years ago. Since it is an epistolary novel, it was perfect for us to take turns reading the chapters aloud to each other.
Last year, I heard about ”Dracula Daily” where subscribers were sent the book via email, on the dates mentioned in the book. What a clever idea! Not surprisingly, this was a huge success and inspired many creative and hilarious online comments. And now the best of these have been collected into a book version along with the original text! (Pub date Sep 19 2023). The comments are printed in the margins so you can read them beside the corresponding sections of original text.
I’m from the generation who uses proper grammar and capitalization when I text. I don’t keep up with memes, etc. So I don’t think I’m the target audience for this book. However, I did laugh out loud at many of the funny comments and fan art that was shared in this book.
If you’re familiar with pop culture and enjoy internet humor, then this book is for you!
Thank you NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Publishing for letting me read “Dracula Daily”.
I was lucky enough to receive a copy of this via NetGalley for a review, though I also have the book preordered and can't wait to see it in print.
I was also lucky enough to be on tumblr last year at the height of Dracula Daily, and it was such an incredible feeling. It was like being in a giant virtual book club where you get to log in every day after your "letter from my dear friend Jonathan" and see what everyone else had to say about it. Tumblr's sense of humor is a favorite and probably not unrealistic to say formative for me given that I've been on the platform for over 10 years. Seeing many of those comments, memes, and fanart in the book alongside the text adds a sense of humor and modern relatability to Dracula.
I also have to recommend that anyone who finds themselves following along to this book to check out the podcast Re: Dracula. It's essentially Dracula Daily in audio format with a full cast for the individual characters and additional content such as songs. It's been an incredible experience following along to both this year and truly adds to the reading of Dracula in general.
Serious props to Matt for doing what he does with the emails and I hope it leads to more successful projects for him in the future.
As a fan of the original dracula daily emails, this book is a great way to have the physical remix of the classic story on hand. A great gift for people who love the original story or are fans of the daily emails. I have already pre-ordered this for family members and cannot wait for the physical copy to arrive when this is published.
I was part of the group that signed up last year to receive emails in real-time of updates from the novel Dracula. When I found out that it was going to be bound into a physical copy, that would include some of the contributions from the online conversation around Dracula Daily last year, I knew I needed to see what extras were included. I was not disappointed, the extra commentary outside of the novel's contents elevated the experience of Dracula Daily even further, and it has been fun to get an email with the day's updates and then flip over to the e-ARC and see what the additional content added to that day's entry is. If you've been wanting to read Dracula, but the original seemed too daunting, this is a great way to break it into smaller pieces so you don't get overwhelmed. If you joined Dracula Daily this year, or you're in your second year of email updates, I'd suggest adding a physical copy as a compliment to the emails. If you've never heard of Dracula Daily but you've always wanted to read the original, this is a much more accessible way of reading it, and you get bonus jokes and art and commentary from random internet users in the margins. It's the most fun way I've found of reading Dracula, and I'm so glad Matt Kirkland came up with this concept.
I have loved being able to read Dracula in this form. The added commentary/memes made the reading experience even more delightful! I stray away from classics because I find them to be confusing and/or intimidating and that was not the case here. So thankful I was able to find this on NetGalley!!
"... Dracula is really about a Victorian D&D party going full murderhobo on a megalomaniacal vampire supervillain as revenge for vamping their polycule sweetheart."
I posted my full thoughts on the story itself in a review for Dracula here, but as far as Dracula Daily goes, I absolutely loved this way of telling the story. Not only do I think the idea of putting everything in chronological order is fantastic, but the memes and comments in the margins were a trip and I laughed out loud at a lot of them. I even followed the link in the author's note to view more of the posts, and I could spend days down that rabbit hole.
If you or someone in your life likes Dracula and appreciates the inherent rampant bisexual chaos this classic holds, definitely grab a copy of Dracula Daily.
Thank you to the publisher for the review copy! All thoughts are honest and my own.
Dracula Daily was a transformative experience while on the internet in 2022, and I am thoroughly delighted to see it memorialized in this fashion.
In 2021, when the COVID pandemic was still going strong, Matt Kirkland started a substack newsletter, sending out the text of Dracula by Bram Stoker, rearranged into chronological order and released in real time. In 2022, he repeated the process and this time it took the internet by storm. There were memes, meta analysis, playlists, and fan arts galore.
It was a genuine delight to be part of this experience last year. Watching so many people discover a classic, and become so invested in it reminds me of why I love reading so much. How we as humans share stories, find things in them to laugh and love and cry and scream over. People posted about missing Jonathan when there was a day without an update, or shared their utter confusion over Dracula's interpretations getting so sexy.
This is a reprint of the story with occasional tweets, tumblr posts, and fan arts reacting to the story. I honestly would have loved even more of this digital marginalia, as I always found it to a positive addition during my own read along.
All my thanks to NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Publishing for this advance reader's copy! And now off to preorder my own copy!
Highly highly recommend this book. It's so much fun to read and it's a wonderful new adaptation of the classic novel. A must read!