Carmilla, a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu published in 1872, is one of the earliest works of vampire fiction, predating Dracula by twenty-five years. The story follows Laura, a young woman living with her father in a remote castle in Styria, Austria. After a mysterious carriage accident, the beautiful and enigmatic Carmilla is placed in their care. As the two women form an intense, increasingly unsettling bond, Laura falls into a strange illness marked by nightmares and weakness. It gradually becomes clear that Carmilla is a vampire, the centuries-old Countess Karnstein. The novella is renowned for its sensual, homoerotic undertones and its lasting influence on vampire literature.
