Okay, you know that vampires have become just another part of the culture, and in some ways an accepted part of the culture, when a superbowl ad is made that features them. That’s right, you heard me – this year we are gonna see an ad running on the superbowl that features our favorite creatures – vampires!
It is not the scariest depiction of vampires, that’s for sure. In fact, the first time I saw it I had to laugh out loud. But hey – Audi makes some pretty cool cars and I love that they used vampires as a way to show that their latest headlights are just like daylight. In fact, for a bunch of vampires who just like to party, a bit too much like sunlight.
Check it out!
If you love vampires then you probably know that one of the most influential books for the entire horror genre is coming up on a big anniversary. This March will see the 100th anniversary of the death of Bram Stocker, the author of the granddaddy of all vampire books – Dracula! To help celebrate this major landmark, the Horror Writers of America are going to award one book as the most influential vampire novel in the 100 years since the death of Bram Stoker. This make the time period we are talking about to be from 1912 to 2011.
They have already narrowed the choices down to six novels, all of which could easily in my humble opinion be worthy of the choice. It is really amazing to think of how many great vampire books have been written over the last 100 years and I would imagine that coming down with this final group of six must have taken some work and probably a certain amount of politics, with various members pushing for their favorite.
The Six Finalists
No matter how you look at it, these final six choices that the judges will vote on to decide the final winner are all winners already. I think it is fair to say that they would make a great “got to read” list for anyone who is coming to this site. Here are the six books they have winnowed it down, before the announcement in March:
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Some may argue that this short story disguised as a novel isn’t even a vampire tale, since he doesn’t really state that is what they are. It is the basic tale of the earth being hit by an epidemic that leaves people acting like vampires, except for our hero. For many- this is the classic post-apocalyptic tale.
This is one of King’s earliest works, and it still packs a punch today. Of course, being King it takes place in a small New England town, and centers Kurt Barlow, a vampire who is running the town until a writer shows up in town to put things back the way they should be. Sorta. But it is classic King.
Interview with a Vampire by Anne Rice
For many this is the book that introduced the modern interpretation of a vampire. Dark, gothic and more than a little homo-erotic, the tale of Lestat and how he became a vampire is told to a young reporter in flash-backs. The New Orleans setting doesn’t hurt the atmosphere, either.
Hotel Transylvania by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
This is from a wonderful series that has the vampire Count Saint Germain travelling through Europe (and time) as we follow his adventurous life. A great fun romp through history and a well told set of stories that bring a bit of fun to the vampire genre.
The Soft Whisper of the Dead by Charles L. Grant
This is a classic tale of evil vampires taking over a small town, but done with such classic horror style as only Grant can do. It takes place in a small town in Connecticut as we follow the evil Count Braslov and his attempts to take over bend the population of the town of Oxrun to his will. It is part of a trilogy but is easily read on its own.
What if Dracula, instead of being defeated by Van Helsing, was to survive? What if he went on to marry Queen Victoria and in fact had a life full of adventures with other great historical and fictional vampires? That is the premise to this wonderful alternate world vampire tale. Published in the early 1990s, it went on to be so successful that Newman followed it up with The Bloody Red Baron and a few other fun little vampire alternate world concepts.
Making the Vote
So there you have it, the six finalists for the title of most influential vampire book of the past century as named by the Horror Writers of America. I even made sure to link them, in case you got curious and decided you just needed to read one of them once again. Or maybe even, for the first time! They are all great books, and some might have even been forgotten in the recent slew of vampire tales, so be sure to check them out.
As far as what I think is the best of the lot, well anyone who reads this site knows how partial I am to Anne Rice. That would be my vote for the most influential. So let us know – what would your vote be?
I know that this isn’t really a feud online, but the media is trying hard to make it like one. If you follow the three ring circus that is the celebrity website circuit, you may have heard something about a comment that Daniel Radcliff made recently on an English talk show called The Jonathan Ross Show. If you follow the career of Robert Pattison you know that before he became Edward on the Twilight franchise, he was in a Harry Potter film playing the role of the heroic Cedric Diggory. In the talk show, Ross asked Radcliff if Harry Potter could beat the vampires in Twilight and Radcliff didn’t miss a beat – he instantly said they could. Basically, in a heartbeat. Now, I am sure that this was all just said as a throwaway line that no one meant anything by, just as Radcliff’s comment that the two are not exactly buddies was not a dig. He just meant they weren’t bosom buddies and Robert Pattison wasn’t too likely to even consider calling up Radcliff for career advice, as was suggested by Ross.
What I find hilarious is that the comment that Harry Potter could beat vampires is all over the web, and is being couched in terms of Radcliff dissing Pattison. Well, anyone that has looked at the clip of the show would know right away that it was just a quick comment that neither the host nor guest gave much thought to. I am pretty sure Radcliff was there to promote some new project and the fact that Twilight just came out is what started this comment.
But don’t take my word for it; here is a clip from the show. See for yourself.
Now- who do you think is stronger? Harry Potter or the vampires from Twilight?
I am always fascinated by the story of how some writer came to start on their current project. With university professor and author N.E. Tovell, that beginning was simply a desire to allow her granddaughter to read a story. When her eleven year old granddaughter became engrossed in the Twilight series, the child’s mother did not want her to read “Breaking Dawn” because she felt her daughter was not old enough for be reading the birth scenes. So Tovell said she would rewrite a PG version for her to read.
In the course of writing it, she began to think about the implications of a half-human half-vampire being. What kind of child would that be and when they grew up, what kind of person would they be? It is the kind of question authors often ask of characters. In this case, it led to her writing A Vampire Trilogy and the latest in the series: Tides of the UnDead.
She describes the second book in the series as a look at the lives of two newlyweds named Galian and Delbeth McDermot. Theirs is an arranged vampire marriage that looks to fulfill an old Celtic prophesy, one that places them in Ireland as the heralds of a new world order. This story follow up the coming-of-age story in book one, and takes us into a world of two species that mirrors so much of our racial tensions.
She calls it a tale of contemporary love surviving in a modern world. But here, the stakes are high as Galian’s headstrong ways and gifts from the world of Faerie clash with Delbeth’s dark vampire ways. It will take their discovery of humility and courage together to overcome the differences and triumph in a world filled with dangerous enemies looking for them to go down in defeat.
Title: The Darkening Dream
Author: Andy Gavin
Release: January 2012
Pages: 392
Genre: Young Adult Vampire
It is Salem, and the year is 1913 when we first meet Sarah, a young Jewish girl with all the dreams of every young girl. Her scholar father has given her a bit of free reign so she has come to know and understand the myths of many lands, including the tales of vampires in Europe. But her life is soon disrupted when a dream vision complete with the trumpeting of a horn leaves her shaken. Worse yet is the day she comes upon a corpse, just like the one in her dream. Was it a premonition?
Then she sees the boy again, through the bodies of others at an amusement park. A new friend, Alex, may be able to help her understand the truth of what she is seeing. But soon even the young Greek immigrant is overwhelmed with the dark reality of what they face. Pursued through the hellholes of factory workshops and fighting for their lives, Sarah and Alex face the fact that they may have brought an ancient horror into their family’s lives.
Can Alex’s grandfather, who has hunted vampires all his life, and Sarah’s scripture-wise father stop the inevitable? As the legendary Gabriel’s Horn sounds in Sarah’s dreams, they band with a group of unlikely brothers to end a centuries-long battle. If they can!
Andy Gavin has delivered an amazing and dark portrayal of vampires unlike much of what you will see in most of today’s fiction. Using the religious imagery of both Christian and Jewish faiths to portray an ancient battle between good and evil, this is a story that is rich in visual and verbal treasures. The Darkening Dream is an unbelievable first novel. I can’t wait to see what Gavin comes up with next!
USA Today had an interesting little story the other day. It looked at the popularity of vampires and asked some leading romance writers what they thought was the reason for this popularity. While it is true that only a year or so ago most editors in traditional publishing were announcing the death (pun intended) of vampire stories, it seems that they are still here and going strong. How could some supposedly well-informed publishing-types be so wrong?
It isn’t that surprising to find that the end result is the same as it has always been. The whole “forbidden love” and “dangerous romance” concept continues to fascinate us, and we aren’t about to give it up just because a couple of desk jockeys in New York have decided that vampires are so yesterday. When romance authors the likes of Jenny Jones and Elizabeth Naughton agree that vampires are the dangerous lovers that so many readers are drawn to, someone is on to something.
Avery Flynn (Up a Dry Creek) calls them the “ultimate in the tortured alpha hero” and I have to agree with her on that one. True Blood may just be the poster child for this kind of hero, but it seems to me that most of the vampires in the “romantic” styled vampire books continue to portray our dark heroes as angst-driven and doomed.
Jane Graves (Heartstrings and Diamond Rings) commented that in vampire tales we ultimately have heroines who control the hero; something I never considered before, but she is right! In the end, most of the vampires find that no matter how big and dangerous they are; love is the thing that holds them. And the heroine, usually a human, is the one that holds that love.
So I guess the end result is always the same – we love our vampires because even though they are the ultimate dangerous bad boy, in the end we love the stories because it is the woman who saves him. For all his dark majesty he is bound and held by a simple thing called love.
Title: Forever Hunger
Author: David Salkin
Release: January 2012
Genre: Mystery Vampire
Adam Priest has been on the run for 200 years, ever since as a Prussian soldier he was turned. Since that time, he has been on a constant hunt to end the hunger that never seems to leave him. In all that time there has been no thought for his victims, until he met Sara.
Doug Patmore is an FBI Special Agent who has hunted a cold killer for years, a killer who brutally ends the life of women in a relentless pattern. He knows this is no ordinary killer, for he has seen what the killer has done to the victims, draining them of their blood and leaving horrifying remains behind.
Roy Ruiz is just an NYPD cop, but when his path crosses Patmore and Priest he will come to understand there is far more to life than what he could have ever considered. When he first started tracking down the serial killer, he didn’t know it was a two hundred year old trail he was following. But he is following it, down to the deadly end. As the cops circle in closer, Sara becomes the one thing that Adam can see might save him – if he can find a way within himself to deal with the emotions she stirs in a heart that no longer beats, and should not be feeling what he knows it is feeling.
In Forever Hunger Salkin spins a different kind of vampire tale, with the grit of an old style detective story combined with the heat of the vampire fantasy sex we have all come to expect from this genre. That this particular vampire is a victim of his own terror is just one more element in a dark tale that will have you gripped and slashing the pages to see where it can possibly go to resolve it all. Or can it?
Like many writers who also write book reviews, I have authors that I have on my short list that I would love to interview. Of course, when it comes to vampire books, the one that always tops my list is Anne Rice. But if you put the Queen of Vampire Fiction aside, there are plenty of great authors I can think of that would be fun to interview for this blog.
One guy that I have come to like as a write is Jim Butcher. I got into his stuff via his character Dresden and it just snowballed from there. I mean, there pretty much isn’t a single thing the guy has written that I haven’t loved. And the cool thing is, he is so down to earth on his blog, which you can read here. The guy even outlines what you need to do when you sit down to write your own masterpiece. And somehow, the attitude that I love in his books shines through even more on his site. His latest book, Ghost Story was nominated for Best Paranormal Fantasy at the Goodreads Choice Awards and his latest collection of Dresden stories Side Jobs is finally out. So although Jim writes far more about wizards and such then vampires per se, I still put him in the “good guys” list for authors I would love to interview.
There are a couple of other authors that come to mind: Poppy Z Brite wrote Exquisite Corpse, a book that for me was a shock and yet also a great introduction to thinking in a whole new way about vampires. If you don’t think her serial killer/lovers are vampires, at least acknowledge they sure as heck share the sensibility of vampires. I know her writing has gone in a lot of different directions in the last bunch of years, but I still consider her one of those very precious vampire/horror writers.
Of course, of the modern crop of vampire writers, I would be remiss to leave Sherrilyn Kenyon off the list. Her Dark Hunter series is just about the best “poster child” for a great fantasy series there is and even her Bad Moon Rising in the Hellraiser series kicks butt and takes names later. It is hard to classify her work because she has created such an inclusive universe of beings that vampires just seem like the least of anyone’s concerns. Well, except that she doesn’t know how to make a non-lethal character, so it would not do to underestimate any of her characters. I love a woman who knows how to write 
awesome and powerful characters that can still leave you rooting for them to succeed. They kinda leave you thinking, if these are the “good guys” the ones they are after must be beyond frightening, and they are!
I am sure there are dozens of great writers I missed out here, but this was just a bit of a musing about how many great writers are out there providing us with some of the best fantasy writing that has been seen in a long time. It really is a great time to be a fan of any kind of paranormal storytelling – but especially of vampire tales!
