Although Dracula In Love was not published until after Transmaniacon -- both in 1979) -- it is the first novel John Shirley wrote. He started writing it about age 17 while living in Portland. Somewhat given to youthful excess, Dracula in Love is still a remarkably readable book and displays the unique and energetic imagination that marks all of Shirley's work. The book's protagonist discovers (at age 33) he is the son of the being upon whom so many tales are based, but this creature is even more powerful and frightening than the myths have made him to be. Ignore the stereotypical shtick cover, Shirley's updated Dracula possesses (or is possessed by) a sexual organ with eyes and inhabited by its own predatory spirit as well as an appreciation of the contemporary submachine gun. The author has described it as starting "with Vlad the Impaler in modern times -- you find out about this tragedy in his life that propels him into vampirism. He's at war with God. So it's a broad coincidence. It's a very intense, twisted book fueled by my adolescent sexuality which was running my life. It was my puerile attempt to make a mystical statement. At the end of the story, Dracula gets absorbed by this earth goddess. Actually, he's drawn into her vagina and goes through a transformation, recognizes his true nature then goes into a communion with God. All this is part of a vampire novel which must have totally baffled most vampire novel fans." William Gibson has called it "an amiably twisted psycho-sexual footnote to Bram Stoker." Author Nancy Collins has said this novel inspired Sunglasses After Dark and its protagonist Sonja Blue.