Nate’s Reviews > Drood > Status Update

I'm so amused/disturbed by what a fucking douchey nutcase Wilkie Collins is in this book. Probably one of my favorite Simmons characters thus far, which is kind of bizarre...but you can't go wrong with an over-imaginative, bitter, self-obsessed Victorian author locked in a Salieri/Mozart-style struggle with both Charles Dickens and a habit of chugging laudanum like water.

Sensing someone else in the room with me, I would look up and see the Other Wilkie sitting silently in the yellow-upholstered spiderweb-backed chair in the far corner. I would go back to work, but when I looked up again, the Other Wilkie would have somehow silently advanced until he was sitting in the curved-back wooden chair I keep near my desk for guests.

Doppelgänger content...truly one of the creepiest ideas ever.

Also, I somehow bought a used ARC and there's a typo here where Detective Hatchery calls Drood "Mr. Dood." I will forever cherish this copy.

Jesus...Victorian London was fucking gross. Also, I can't stop wondering what laudanum tastes like now.