Book review – “Carmilla” by J. Sheridan LeFanu

The second most influential vampire book after Dracula because this helped popularise the concept of lesbian vampires. It's a pretty good novella, light on plot but there's plenty of eroticism, atmosphere and violence; the lesbian stuff is implied more than spelt it - it's more "romantic friendship" of intense attraction rather than anything explicit - but is still quite potent, and you can imagine it must have created a stir at the time.