Preview: "Anno Dracula: The Bloody Red Baron" by Kim Newman

“How could World War I be made even grislier? Add vampires, as Newman does with great skill in this sequel to his Anno Dracula.” – Booklist

Written by the critically acclaimed novelist Kim Newman, The Bloody Red Baron [Titan Books, April 2012] is the eagerly anticipated follow-up to the bestselling Victorian vampire novel, Anno Dracula. Filled with literary and historical characters from the early 20th century, this second book in the groundbreaking series on the War of the Great Powers in Europe sees an alternate Europe in a pitched war between the living and the undead!

It is 1918 and Dracula is commander-in-chief of the armies of Germany and Austria-Hungary. The Diogenes Club is at the heart of the British Intelligence and Charles Beauregard and his protégé Edwin Winthrop go head-to-head with the lethal vampire flying machine that is the Bloody Red Baron.

This brand-new edition of The Bloody Red Baron includes a special added bonus: a lengthy new novella, Vampire Romance, which is set in the 1920s between the events of The Bloody Red Baron and the third novel in Anno Dracula Series, Dracula Cha Cha Cha. This volume also boasts intriguing new annotations from Kim Newman and an action-packed outline for a film version of The Bloody Red Baron called Red Skies.

On first publication in 1992, Kim Newman’s brilliantly imagined story Anno Dracula was praised by critics and won numerous prizes, including the prestigious International Horror Guild Award for Best Novel. Now, due to the modern reader’s fascination with vampires and speculative histories, this enduring classic Dracula series is brought to a new generation of fans.

Praise for Anno Dracula:

“It was the first mash-up of literature, history and vampires, and now, in a world in which vampires are everywhere, it's still the best, and its bite is just as sharp. Compulsory reading, commentary, and mindgame: glorious."  — NEIL GAIMAN

“Politics, horror and romance are woven together in this brilliantly imagined and realized novel.” — Time Out

Anno Dracula The multi-award winning series depicts an alternative history in which the heroes of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula fail to stop Count Dracula’s conquest of Great Britain. Titan will publish a brand new edition of the third book, Dracula Cha Cha Cha, in Fall 2012. The eagerly awaited fourth novel, Johnny Alucard, will be published for the first time in 2013.

Kim Newman is a London-based author and movie critic. He makes frequent appearances on radio and TV. He has won the Bram Stoker, International Horror Guild, British Fantasy and British Science Fiction Awards and been nominated for the Hugo and World Fantasy Awards. He writes regularly for Empire Magazine and contributes to The Guardian, The Times, Time Out and others.

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Titan Books was kind enough to consider me when sending out review copies of The Bloody Red Baron, so stay tuned because I will be posting a review of the novel in the near future.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update, a volunteer editor for the Alt Hist magazine and a contributor to Just Below the Law. One of his short stories will be published in the upcoming Echelon Press anthology, Once Upon a Clockwork Tale (2013). When not writing he works as an attorney in the state of Illinois and enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana.