Dracula has been a pretty big staple of horror for more than 100 years. That’s all thanks to the brilliance of author Bram Stoker, a man who literally has an award named after him, and his timeless novel Dracula. It’s a story that’s been told and retold many, many times, to the point where one might imagine there are no fresh ways to approach the material anymore. Not so fast!
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We here at Fango are proud to exclusively announce the forthcoming Kickstarter launch for Dracula: Book III – The Count, which is set to go live in a few weeks. For now, there is a pre-launch page that you can use to stay up to date on the project. To go along with getting the Kickstarter on everyone’s radar, we’ve also got not one but two pieces of exclusive cover art for you to check out below.
The book hails from comic book creators Matt Wagner (Grendel, Mage) and Kelley Jones (Batman: Red Rain, The Sandman), who are reuniting to produce a new chapter in their series of Dracula graphic novels. The previous entry was Dracula: Book II – The Brides.
For Book III, Wagner and Jones decided to go back to where it all started in the pages of Stoker’s original eponymous novel. Rather than try to tell a different story altogether, they are going to show us the events of the book from a totally different perspective: “One of the distinctive aspects of Stoker’s original novel is that it’s epistolary, told exclusively in the form of journal entries, letters of correspondence and news articles,” Wagner said. “The only voice missing from these various narrations is the most crucial one of all…Dracula himself! So our version of these events is narrated by Dracula himself from inside the mind of an unrepentant monster.” A brief logline for the book reads as follows:
“Dracula: Book III – The Count takes place in the shadows of the original novel and tells the familiar and horrifying tale from Dracula’s own point of view.”
“Anyone who’s familiar with Stoker’s original novel knows that once the action shifts to England, the title character is basically all-but unseen for the remainder of the narrative,” Wagner said. “A sinister, charismatic and scheming vampire lord set loose on the streets of London…and it’s so frustrating because we never get to see him! Well, he’s definitely up to something most foul…and now Kelley and I are finally unveiling what he was doing during that terrifying period. We’ll see him exploring and planning to exploit his new home, this grand and modern British Empire, a vast realm on which, it was said, the sun never set.”
“From our very first discussions of this project, this was the part I thought would be the trickiest to pull off,” Jones added. “But it was also the part I was looking forward to the most! What Matt does so beautifully is to combine literary and historical accuracy with an utterly compelling story that keeps you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end. Every time I read one of his scripts, I find myself so fully engaged in how the story unfolds…I almost forget that I’m the one who gets to draw this incredible tale!”
The new volume will be 120 pages in a European-album sized hardcover edition. Wagner and Jones once again have teamed up with José Villarrubia on colors and Rob Leigh for lettering.
You can show your support for Dracula: Book III – The Count on Kickstarter. Fans can now follow the pre-launch page to get an email when the project launches in a few weeks.
