<DIV>The primal image of the black-caped vampire Dracula has become an indelible fixture of the modern imagination. It's recognition factor rivals, in its own perverse way, the familiarity of Santa Claus. Most of us can recite without prompting the salient characteristics of the vampire: sleeping by day in its coffin, rising at dusk to feed on the blood of the living; the ability to shapeshift into a bat, wolf, or mist; a mortal vulnerability to a wooden stake through the heart or a shaft of sunlight. In this critically acclaimed excursion through the life of a cultural icon, David Skal maps out the archetypal vampire's relentless trajectory from Victorian literary oddity to movie idol to cultural commidity, digging through the populist veneer to reveal what the prince of darkness says about us all.<BR></div> <DIV><b>David J. Skal</b> is the author of numerous critically acclaimed books, including <i>The Monster Show</i>; <i>Death Makes a Holiday</i>;<i> Screams of Reason</i>; and, with Elias Savada, <i>Dark Carnival: The Secret World of Todd Browning</i>. With Nina Auerbach, he is the co-editor of the Norton Critical Edition of Bram Stoker's <i>Dracula</i>. Skal's writing has appeared in a variety of publications, ranging from <i>The New York Times</i> to <i>Cinefantastique</i>, and, for television, on the A&amp;E series <i>Biography</i>. A longtime New Yorker, he currently lives and writes in Glendale, California.<BR></div> <DIV>Count Dracula&#8212;the original monster as icon&#8212;has long haunted the modern imagination. Renowned pop-culture author and film critic Skal here provides us with "the ultimate book on Dracula" (<i>Newsweek</i>) by fully and engagingly exploring his creation, evolution, and widespread infiltration. Now appearing in a revised edition, <i>Hollywood Gothic</i> maps the archetypal vampire's trajectory from Victorian literary oddity to early-film sensation to modern cultural commodity. Along the way, Skal also reveals what this dark prince says about us all.<BR></div> <DIV>"Meticulously researched, engagingly written, and packed with rare, archival images . . . This history of <i>Dracula</i> reads life a novel itself."&#8212;<b><i>The San Francisco Bay Chronicle</i></b><BR></div> <DIV>"Meticulously researched, engagingly written, and packed with rare, archival images . . . This history of <i>Dracula</i> reads life a novel itself."&#8212;<b><i>The San Francisco Bay Chronicle</i></b><BR><BR>"Anyone interested in Bram Stoker's <i>Dracula</i> will find this book indispensable."&#8212;<b>Ray Bradbury </b><BR><BR>"[Skal] tracks Transylvania's most popular vampire with dry wit and the skills of a fine detective."&#8212;<b><i>The New York Times Book Review</i></b><BR></div>