Séance for a Vampire

I'm always drawn in by new stories featuring Sherlock Holmes, add in his distant cousin Count Dracula and a seance orchestrated by a mysterious Russian vampire-pirate, and this fit the bill for totally enthralling escapism. :) Saberhagen does Holmes really well, though Dracula is often pompous, but, hey, he's royalty, so it's expected. The plot plays out like a typical Holmes mystery, but with a twist of having vampires involved. I think the editor fell down a bit on the job, because unless the author was going for deliberate repetition between sections that Watson narrated and those that Dracula narrated, there were whole paragraphs repeated verbatim. There's a sequence near the end that's a plot line direct from Stoker's "Dracula", show more but Saberhagen's Dracula comments on it, so I guess it's okay. Overall, weaker than The Holmes-Dracula Tape, but still a fun read. show less

Suppose Sherlock Holmes had a case that led into dangerous supernatural territory -- so dangerous that the only possible help could come from Sherlock's cousin, Prince Dracula. I know ... it sounds a bit far-fetched but it really works!

A young woman disappears during a leisurely rowboat trip and turns up dead a day later. When spiritualists arrive to take advantage of her mother and promise that they can contact Louisa, her father goes to London to ask Sherlock Holmes for help revealing the charlatans for what they are. However, when Holmes and Watson attend the séance they must admit that something out of the norm is happening. The young woman appears out of nowhere, looking pale and having no reflection, one of the spiritualists is show more brutally murdered and Holmes is dragged off by a powerful malevolent force. So Watson must turn to the only one who can help -- Prince Dracula.

I had a lot of fun with this book! It was the perfect read for a summer afternoon. This is actually one of a series of Holmes books by different authors and I plan to read more of them. Usually I'm touchy about retooling of characters but I think that Holmes has been taken in so many different directions over the years that I've come to accept it. So why not see what his adventures would be like with Dr. Jekyll or martians?

http://webereading.com/2010/07/new-release-seance-for-vampire.html show less

I must admit, after the somewhat-dull stories of the previous couple of Dracula books, this one is more enjoyable. It brings back the Dracula/Sherlock Holmes relationship and enhances it by assuming we all know that Dracula and Holmes are distant cousins. I don’t remember reading this in the Holmes-Dracula File, and Holmes hasn’t appeared in any of the other Dracula books Saberhagen wrote.

In any case, it was a better book than some of the previous ones were. It still doesn’t reach the height of the first book, which was eminently enjoyable.

In this book, a couple outside early 20th century London are convinced that a seance has brought back their (vampire) daughter to them. When the father askes Holmes to investigate, realizes show more they’re probably dealing with vampires from his previous experiences with Dracula, gets kidnapped, Watson calls on Dracula for help, they track down the evil vampire and wreak their vengeance.

Also appearing in this book is Rasputin, as a small side character. The plot was interesting, although not all was wrapped up in the end (whatever happened to Doll?).

A better read than several of its predecessors, I give this book 3.5 stars.

The Dracula Series:
* The Dracula Tape (1975)
* The Holmes-Dracula File (1978)
* An Old Friend of the Family (1979)
* Thorn (1980)
* Dominion (1982)
* From the Tree of Time (1982) (short story)
* A Matter of Taste (1990)
* A Question of Time (1992)
* Seance for a Vampire (1994)
* A Sharpness on the Neck (1996)
* Box Number Fifty (2001) (short story)
* A Coldness in the Blood (2002) show less

You definitely want to have read The Holmes-Dracula File before reading this or you won't have a clue as to what's going on.

A rather unusual case presents itself to Sherlock Holmes this time. A man comes to him and Dr. Watson telling him a story about how his wife had hired two spiritualists to perform a seance at his home. He would have no part in the affair, but his wife related to him that the mediums had conjured up his daughter, Louisa, who had earlier drowned in a boating accident. When Louisa appeared, she told her mother that she must produce some treasure which had been stolen by another party over a hundred years earlier, and only then could she rest peacefully in death. The man is convinced that this is an extortion attempt show more by the mediums and wants Holmes to close them down. So another seance is held, with Holmes & Watson in attendance, and this time the young dead girl's father. This time, however, everyone sees the girl who repeats her demand for the recovery of the stolen treasure. Before the lights go on, however, Sherlock Holmes disappears and Dr. Watson fears the cause of his disappearance is related to vampires, and calls in Count Dracula for assistance.

Not quite as well done as the Holmes-Dracula file, but a fun read all the same. show less

It was OK, but not super. We're back to Sherlock Holmes, entirely in 1903. Much of the book is written from Watson's perspective with the remainder from Dracula's. Sometimes the shifts are too quick or often for me - jarring. All told it wasn't bad. Might deserve 3 stars, but it just didn't hold me like some of the others.

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