Reluctant Immortals

“Imaginative story involving immortals Lucy Westenra (Dracula victim in Stoker's novel) and Bertha Mason (Jane Eyre's mad woman in the attic) living in counterculture era Los Angeles. Everlasting life isn't particularly glamorous but theirs is a sisterhood (dare I say, dependency?), which keeps them afloat. Their lives are upended when their antagonizers (Dracula and Mr. Rochester, respectively) arrive on the Haight-Ashbury scene, disrupting the women's sense of security and safety. There is beautiful imagery of both a San Francisco and LA of days past (particuarly a scene involving the now-defunct Playland along San Francisco's Great Highway) and Kiste has such lush prose. A novel of California dreaming and nightmares. Loved it.”