Happy World Dracula Day (May 26th) to those who celebrate! On this most solemn of occasions, isn’t it time you learned the horrifying, true history of Vlad “The Impaler” Dracula, who somehow managed to be a psychopath and a national hero? (Hint: The answer is “yes.”) Buy or gift Backpacking…

It’s almost Halloween and you know what that means; a new round of manufactured urban legends to distract and scare simpleminded people into ignoring that their Republican elected officials probably wouldn’t stop to pee on them if they were on fire. But! It also means a reliable uptick in interest…

Though it feels like a lifetime ago, it’s been five years since I recorded this interview with Rick Steves, talking about Vlad “The Impaler” Dracula. It was one of the maybe three or five instances in my whole life where I benefited from exquisite timing. Steves had recently returned from…

A few years ago, someone saw this Vlad The Impaler comic strip, thought of me immediately, and sent it to me. This has occurred several times a year ever since, most recently just a couple weeks ago. So, I have finally decided to share it with you. Those of you…

Can you identify the real Dracula’s Castle from these pictures? This week marked the 124th anniversary of the novel Bram Stoker’s DRACULA. (The 125th anniversary is going to be a real banger, I bet.) To mark the occasion, I’m going to provide you with priceless information that will make you…

Since its release in late-2016, it’s become a welcome tradition that I do an in-bookstore reading from Backpacking with Dracula each year around Halloween. That’s not happening this year, due to the U.S. transforming into a belligerent, failed, plague state, so I decided to do a reading via my very…

The landmark novel, Bram Stoker’s DRACULA, has proven to be as immortal as its vampire antagonist. May 26, 2017 marks the 120th anniversary of the novel’s publication, during which time it’s never been out of print, sparking a wildly prolific, vampire-fixated century in literature, stage, cinema and television. Eventually. [Large…

I’ll just leave this here. BUY THE BOOK!

It is with enormous satisfaction and pride that I announce the publication of my first solo, book-length project, a Romania travel memoir called Backpacking with Dracula. Honestly, so many nights and weekends have been dedicated to working on this project for the past year and a half, I guess the prevailing…

Is Dracula real? Vlad Dracula was kind of like the Marilyn Manson of historic Romania. He was pretty twisted, but not nearly as twisted as the widely circulated rumors about him suggested, and, of course, he was considered a hero by many – even today (despite poor record sales). Nevertheless,…