The First Third

Now that I have Mimi’s situation worked out, nicely I think, there is the whole Edgar/Lilla relationship issue. Stoker, after a possible…typo?…where he has Adam falling in love with Lilla (before course correcting to have him end up with Mimi), clearly means for Lilla to set her cap on Edgar.

The problem is, they have three or four interactions: The party, the first staring contest, the second staring contest (which might be the first, repeated, but I don’t think so), and then he kills her.

I’ve got a lot of support for Lilla wanting to help Edgar. That is, I’ve developed her character to the point where at least it seems possible for her to be in a situation to find him attractive, but for actual actions, there’s still the whole “every time we get together, he tries to mesmerize me” thing. (Who does he think he is? Scott Adams?)

I have the mechanism for his potential reform, which must exist lest the reader think Lilla is an idiot. (She might be, and the reader might be inclined to feel that way, but they must at least understand how she came to do idiotic things, or she may become unsympathetic.)

The thing is, Edgar has his own issues, so if his potential reform is too reformative, then we will feel cheated if he just does a heel-turn, and we also won’t believe he’s very menacing if he’s out…IDK…feeding orphans.

See, this is why I type this stuff up: By saying it out loud, or at least writing it out, solutions reveal themselves. It might be worth a re-read of Red Dragon, actually, since the serial killer in that proves to be rather sympathetic at times. Not that Edgar’s a serial killer, exactly. But he’s probably messed up psychologically on that level.

Meanwhile, Arabella.

When you think about it, the source has four villains, which is a lot for a short book. Edgar, Oolanga, Lady Arabella and the White Worm itself. Regardless of Stoker’s apparent plan to make the last two one and the same, they actually behave as completely separate characters (and are seen together only once, in corpse form).

And a weakness of the book is that the White Worm does literally nothing till about 2/3rds of the way through, and if we’re being honest the only thing Arabella does is kill Oolanga in a very confusing scene that could be read as self-defense.

Arabella has to be more active. The other characters (including Uncle Richard and the White Worm) have all stepped up, and it’s time for the Lady to start causing even more mischief.