INTERVIEW: Michael J. Seidlinger's Brokeula Sinks Its Teeth Into Capitalism’s Woes
**This review originally appeared in our July 2026 print issue**
Provided by Books Forward and Michael J. Seidlinger
“Can anyone afford to live forever?"
Every generation gets the Dracula it deserves.
For readers living through layoffs, subscription fatigue, side hustles, rising debt, and the uneasy feeling that nobody can quite get ahead anymore, Troy author Michael J. Seidlinger may have created the perfect vampire for our current moment. His new novel, Brokeula, available July 7 through CLASH Books, introduces James Sugré, a centuries old vampire whose greatest enemy is not sunlight, not garlic, or a determined vampire hunter. It's overdraft fees.
"My painful hunger doesn't come from a need for blood," James declares early in the novel. "It comes from shit like this."
That line serves as the mantra for a novel that gleefully skewers late-stage capitalism while embracing the absurdity of horror comedy. Seidlinger takes the familiar mythology of Dracula and drops it directly into a world of mounting debt, failed investments, endless notifications, and economic anxiety. The result is sharply funny, surprisingly heartfelt, and often painfully relatable.
The premise alone feels destined for cult status. James is a broke vampire living in a tiny apartment, staring at negative bank balances and wondering how immortality became so expensive. After centuries of failed investments ranging from retail to hedge funds to cryptocurrency, he finds himself asking a question that sits at the heart of the novel: "Can anyone afford to live forever?"
The answer arrives in the form of Lauren Wilkes, a horror-obsessed professional who discovers his secret and accidentally helps create the worst business idea in vampire history. Together they launch a vampire conversion service that quickly evolves into a bloodsucking, multi-level marketing empire called Bloodsucker LLC.
What follows is part workplace satire, part startup culture parody, part horror novel, and entirely Seidlinger's own creation. One of the book's funniest scenes arrives when Lauren surveys James' shabby apartment and casually tells him, "You're like a dollar store Dracula." When he protests, she delivers the line that gives the novel its title: "You're broke. You're... Brokeula."
The joke lands not only because it’s ridiculous, but because it feels true.
Throughout the novel, Seidlinger repeatedly finds ways to connect vampire mythology to modern economic systems. Blood becomes a commodity. Immortality becomes a luxury service. Relationships become transactions. Even eternal life is packaged, marketed, and sold through tiered payment plans. As the business grows, so does the satire. What begins as a desperate attempt to escape poverty eventually balloons into franchising, luxury clientele, celebrity conversions, and a vampire startup culture that feels alarmingly familiar to modern day life.
Yet, Brokeula works because Seidlinger never loses sight of the loneliness underneath the jokes.
James may be immortal, but he is also exhausted. He carries centuries of failure and disappointment. His hunger for wealth often masks a deeper desire for meaning and connection. Even as the novel grows more outrageous, those emotional undercurrents remain.
That honesty comes directly from Seidlinger's own experiences. "For most of my life, I've been a struggling artist," he admits. "Western society specifically is never kind to its creatives." Rather than creating a distant supernatural monster, he channels very real frustrations into James' predicament. The result is a character who feels remarkably human despite being hundreds of years old. Readers may laugh at the absurdity of vampire marketing and immortality packages, but they will also recognize the underlying fear of running out of options, or simply trying to make it through another day.
The balance between humor and humanity has become one of Seidlinger's defining strengths as a writer. Whether he’s working in horror or satire, he consistently explores loneliness, identity, and survival through unconventional stories. "I hope people find it funny in a dark humor sort of way," he states. "It's more so like, hey, I can relate to this guy being in this shitty situation." That relatability is what elevates Brokeula beyond parody. Beneath the fangs and absurdity is a story about trying to find dignity in a world that constantly assigns value to people based on what they own and earn.
What becomes clear after speaking with Seidlinger is that the same offbeat imagination that drives Brokeula is very much present in the author himself. Our conversation unexpectedly drifted into a hilarious brainstorming session about how The Blair Witch Project could exist in a world of smartphones, with Seidlinger immediately diving into the mechanics of modern horror. “Who walks into the woods without a cell phone?” he jokes before proposing a supernatural workaround: “The Blair Witch shifts time around.”
It is a small but revealing moment. Seidlinger is a writer constantly looking for the crack in a familiar idea, the strange angle nobody has considered yet. That same instinct transforms Dracula from a powerful aristocrat into a financially desperate vampire chasing the promise of a better life. As we joked about pitching our own version of Blair Witch, Seidlinger laughs, “We got a better one for you.” That confidence, wit, and willingness to completely tear apart genre conventions is exactly what makes Brokeula so much fun. Behind every absurd idea is a writer who genuinely loves horror, understands its history, and is always asking what new nightmare might be hiding in the everyday.
For readers in the Capital Region, there is something especially satisfying about seeing a Troy author continue to push the genre into new territory. Brokeula feels fearless in its willingness to blend comedic horror with social commentary. The result is one of the year's most entertaining genre novels and one of its sharpest observations about modern life. Brokeula leaves readers with a sobering thought that sometimes the hardest thing to survive isn't eternity, it's everyday life.
Michael J. Seidlinger celebrates the release of Brokeula with two Brooklyn launch events on July 8 and July 13. More information can be found at michaeljseidlinger.com