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lapingveno's review against another edition
2.0
This felt like the lazy novelization of a rambling, listless Call of Cthulhu RPG campaign whose GM was a raving racist. With TWO antagonists as interesting as a monomaniacal, petty-noble hypnotist and a shape-shifting, millennium-old serpent-woman, one would have expected a little more...I don't know...SUSPENSE. Even the romantic subplot was blah; I think the protagonist was made of LITERAL cardboard. Props where given: there is an explosion in the last chapter, but that payoff is hardly worth the invested time. :(
countessjess's review against another edition
3.0
The Lair of the White Worm is the second novel I’ve read by Bram Stoker, the first being Dracula, naturally. I found a big difference between the two books. Dracula is one of my absolute favourite books, and though I didn’t expect this book to equal Dracula, I did expect it to be good.
I did enjoy this book, at first anyway. It started out in a promising manner but I felt like it let itself down a lot. I enjoyed reading about the bond between Sir Nathaniel and Adam, but was kind of hoping for more of a bond between Adam and his uncle as well.
The beginning of the book seems to set the Caswall family up as some sort of really weird, spooky, evil line of people. And while Edgar Caswall is very eccentric, he can’t be said to be evil, rather just mad. And that’s a bit of a disappointment because I expected more from him. I also couldn’t quite work out the point of his whole mesmerism deal and how it really related back to the main story.
Lady Arabella was creepy, but I would have liked to have known more about her. The thing about this book is that is has a lot of characters that it seems to want to focus on. At the beginning it’s just Adam, his uncle, Sir Nathaniel, and Edgar Caswall. But then it starts adding in Lady Arabella and Mimi as key characters too, and the book is just too short for all this to be done effectively. It just feels like Stoker was trying to zone in on too many characters in too much depth for such a short book.
The racism in this book was hideous, too. I tried to just ignore it for the most part but a couple of times it just became really difficult. I would suggest that it would be worth pushing through - if the book was better. As it is, I don’t really see a reason to read about that much racism with a lacklustre conclusion to the book.
I will say that I really did enjoy the parts of this book in which Adam and Sir Nathaniel had their discussions. I felt they had a really good dynamic and what they talked about was interesting. But yeah, otherwise, this book was not that excellent, though the idea definitely had promise.
I did enjoy this book, at first anyway. It started out in a promising manner but I felt like it let itself down a lot. I enjoyed reading about the bond between Sir Nathaniel and Adam, but was kind of hoping for more of a bond between Adam and his uncle as well.
The beginning of the book seems to set the Caswall family up as some sort of really weird, spooky, evil line of people. And while Edgar Caswall is very eccentric, he can’t be said to be evil, rather just mad. And that’s a bit of a disappointment because I expected more from him. I also couldn’t quite work out the point of his whole mesmerism deal and how it really related back to the main story.
Lady Arabella was creepy, but I would have liked to have known more about her. The thing about this book is that is has a lot of characters that it seems to want to focus on. At the beginning it’s just Adam, his uncle, Sir Nathaniel, and Edgar Caswall. But then it starts adding in Lady Arabella and Mimi as key characters too, and the book is just too short for all this to be done effectively. It just feels like Stoker was trying to zone in on too many characters in too much depth for such a short book.
The racism in this book was hideous, too. I tried to just ignore it for the most part but a couple of times it just became really difficult. I would suggest that it would be worth pushing through - if the book was better. As it is, I don’t really see a reason to read about that much racism with a lacklustre conclusion to the book.
I will say that I really did enjoy the parts of this book in which Adam and Sir Nathaniel had their discussions. I felt they had a really good dynamic and what they talked about was interesting. But yeah, otherwise, this book was not that excellent, though the idea definitely had promise.
bosermoki's review against another edition
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
melisaesra13's review against another edition
4.0
Was very interested of this novel; I've read quite a lot of Bram Stoker, but mostly short stories and that would be my second novel that I read by him.
The plot is really enjoyable, much like the writing.
Yeah... About the racism... I kind of created some theories which I would like to talk about in much vaster detail after possibly rereading the book. I do think that the malicious things said and done about/to the black characters, got their revenge from the death of the white opressors.
Would really like to make a YouTube video about this book, it did stimulate my brain a bit.
❤️
The plot is really enjoyable, much like the writing.
Yeah... About the racism... I kind of created some theories which I would like to talk about in much vaster detail after possibly rereading the book. I do think that the malicious things said and done about/to the black characters, got their revenge from the death of the white opressors.
Would really like to make a YouTube video about this book, it did stimulate my brain a bit.
❤️
italian_herbs's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
1.5
nooker's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
ser_benton's review against another edition
More entertaining than Dracula by a mile. Of course it's terrible and certain passages contain the absolute most racist rantings I've ever read, but it's memorable because of that. Helped along by the podcast 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back, it becomes one of the funniest books I've read and a touchstone on how bad a book can be while still being incredibly entertaining. Recommended only if you follow along with the podcast.
claudia_is_reading's review against another edition
1.0
Rabid racism and misogyny? Checked. And not, it's not only the N word, which it seems to have been added in a later edition. It's the whole thing that it's utterly disgusting.
I'll chalk up this disaster to the fact that Bram Stoker was terminally ill when he wrote it.
I'll chalk up this disaster to the fact that Bram Stoker was terminally ill when he wrote it.
bickleyhouse's review against another edition
5.0
This was a great story. I didn't realize that Bram Stoker wrote this until I found it on Project Gutenberg. I remember seeing the movie years ago with Amanda Donahoe in it. It's a pretty creepy story, involving love, jealousy, and some wicked cool supernatural monster stuff. I've decided that Bram Stoker was seriously disturbed...