TWILIGHT, Weres Fight, Emotions are Outasight

It is now official: those who aren't writing vampire stories, are writing about those who read or watch vampire stories.  Most stories I've seen are by guys saying how there are much better movies about vampires than the Twilight series.  But if you're looking for a sensitive and intelligent piece about why Twilight appeals to young women, Paul Byrnes has one in The Age, an Australian newspaper.

For too long, Hollywood has seen teen passion in terms of boys who want to lose their virginity. [Stephanie] Meyer corked that bottle and switched it: Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), a vampire of virtue, refused to give himself to Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) for most of the first two movies. He went into exile rather than respond to her increasingly powerful desires. He loved her but would not risk hurting her, one of the foundation ideas of the romance novel.

Byrnes also comments on the change of directors.  Can you think of another situation when a director as insanely successful as Catherine Hardwicke was replaced for the second in a series?    The film studio has taken an emotion-driven story and tried to turn it into an actioner to draw male audiences. 

Catherine Hardwicke concentrated on the depth of emotion in part one, Chris Weitz made part two more of a saga, and David Slade makes the third bigger, louder and coarser...

Bella's emotions drove the earlier films because they were grave and real, anchoring the fantasy elements. The fantasy grows in the third film, at the expense of her character. Does any- one go to these films to see a fight between werewolves and vampires

All and all, this is a very nice and serious treatment of the films.

Jeaniene Frost has a new book coming out at the end of July.  Eternal Kiss of Darkness is the second in her Night Huntress World series.

Here's the publisher's description:

Chicago private investigator Kira Graceling should have just kept on walking. But her sense of duty refused to let her ignore the moans of pain coming from inside a warehouse just before dawn. Suddenly she finds herself in a world she's only imagined in her worst nightmares.

At the center is Mencheres, a breathtaking Master vampire who thought he'd seen it all. Then Kira appears - this fearless, beautiful....human who braved death to rescue him. Though her burns for her, keeping Kira in his world means risking her life. Yet sending her away is unthinkable.

But with danger closing in, Mencheres must choose either the woman he craves, or embracing the darkest magic to defeat an enemy bent on his eternal destruction.

You can learn more by visiting Jeaniene's website, and she's got a book trailer posted.

One of my fans (yes, I do have one) asked me why I don't have a trailer for Midnight Brunch.  The answer is, it takes me too dang long to make them and then they're these weird clumsy slide shows with wonky graphics...with fluffy kittens.   I wish someone would make a trailer for me.  I'm going to post my first one here anyway.



Okay, the fluffy kittens are in the video for The Bride of Casa Dracula. See for yourselves.



You can see how my time here as a blogger has influenced my videos and other creative work.

GRATUITOUS VIDEOS OF THE DAY

How do I pick these?  Generally I go to YouTube and do a search combining terms like:  vampire, Dracula, Tom Jones, hawt, True Blood, Britney, Mick St. John, rock, Sookie, Buffy, Bon Jovi, etc.  I find great videos like this one, but I've already posted it so then I narrow my search to videos posted either this week or this month.  And you thought I just posted anything.  Ha.

That's how I found this.  It has some boobies in it, so don't act all shocked.  I'm more appalled by Anna Paquin's weird voice and accent.  I like Southern accents but her "Ah ahhhm hees" bugs.  Opinions from actual Southerners -- do you think her voice grates?

Sometimes I find videos with songs that make my brain hurt.



Other times I find videos like this gem set to the Beatles' spare and elegant "Blackbird."

Contest Weiner, UNHOLY MAGIC Release, & Vampires in Lurve

You can read a new interview with me over at Gozamos.  Natalie Reece finds out more than you want to know about why I have no desire to be a vampire:  "First, you’d be dead. Second, you’d be cold. Third, if people seem really boring now, imagine how boring they’ll seem after a few hundred years."

Thanks to everyone who entered the contest for Stacia Kane's Unholy Magic, which is being released today!  The weiner of the contest is:

Natalie of Mindful Musings

Natalie, please send me an email with your mailing address so I can send your prize.  Hope you enjoy Unholy Magic!

Congratulations, too, to Stacia Kane, on her release day and having her novel, Unholy Ghosts, selected as a fantasy read by the Times (London)!  You can learn more about Unholy Magic, book two of her Downside Ghosts series, and read excerpts at her website.   You can also read Stacia's guest blog here at Vampire Wire. 

I'm listing Natalie's book review site, Mindful Musings, as a Blog to Watch.  It's quite a pretty layout with tons of great content.  While Natalie reviews all genres, she's got a special fondness for paranormal/urban fantasy and YA.   Hmm, maybe Natalie would like to review a certain hilarious series featuring a wacky chica who gets involved with snobby vamps.  I'm going to add this to my blogroll and if you enjoy YA paranormal  & UF, you may want to bookmark it.

Natalie's favorite ghost story is A Certain Slant of Light by Laura Whitcomb.  I'd never heard of this book before, but this book sounds fascinating and the title is wonderful for a ghost story.

The publisher's summary is sparse, so here's Francesca Goldsmith's review in  School Library Journal:

Helen died 130 years ago as a young woman. Unable to enter heaven because of a sense of guilt she carried at death, she has been silent and invisible but conscious and sociable across the generations. Her spirit has been sustained by its attachment to one living human host after another, including a poet and, most recently, a high-school English teacher. While she sits through his class one day, she becomes aware of James and he–unlike the mortals all around them–is aware of her as well. James, who also died years earlier, inhabits the body of a contemporary teen, Billy.

James and Helen fall in love, he shows her how to inhabit the body of a person whose spirit has died but who still lives and breathes, and the two begin to unfold the mysteries of their own pasts and those of their adolescent hosts. Jenny, whose body Helen now uses, is the only child of strict religious parents who controlled her beyond what her spirit could endure. Billy's spirit left his body after a string of tragedies resulting from drug abuse and domestic violence. James and Helen court in both modern and old-fashioned ways; here is a novel in which explicit sex is far from gratuitous or formulaic. Whitcomb writes with a grace that befits Helen's more modulated world while depicting contemporary society with sharp insight. In the subgenre of dead-narrator tales, this book shows the engaging possibilities of immortality–complete with a twist at the end that wholly satisfies.

Visit Laura Whitcomb's website.

The Midnight Moon Cafe chicks are having a contest for Vivi Ana's newly released The Vampire's Kiss and a pair of thigh-high fishnets.  Just leave a comment on who you think is the best vampire kisser.  The contest runs through July 8, Thursday, midnight. 

GRATUITOUS VIDEOS OF THE DAY

In honor of the Midnight Moon Cafe's contest for Vivi Ana's A Vampire's Kiss, here are kissing GVDs.  Enjoy!

WARNING: Supposedly there's some mature content in this, but YouTube is loading so slowly that I don't have the patience to watch it through. If you are easily offended, well, you probably shouldn't be reading my blog anyway.

Black & White & Red All Over: Covers Theme

Here are some new and newish books you may want to check out. The black/white/red color scheme is a classic one for paranormals/urban fantasy.  As usual, I got the images from Fantastic Fiction, which always has the best and most-up-to-date cover graphics.

The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff (September 2010)

Publisher's Summary:

Mackie Doyle is not one of us. Though he lives in the small town of Gentry, he comes from a world of tunnels and black murky water, a world of living dead girls ruled by a little tattooed princess. He is a Replacement - left in the crib of a human baby sixteen years ago. Now, because of fatal allergies to iron, blood, and consecrated ground, Mackie is fighting to survive in the human world.

Mackie would give anything to live among us, to practice on his bass or spend time with his crush, Tate. But when Tate's baby sister goes missing, Mackie is drawn irrevocably into the underworld of Gentry, known as Mayhem. He must face the dark creatures of the Slag Heaps and find his rightful place, in our world, or theirs.

Visit Brenna Yovanoff's website.

Moonshine by Alaya Johnson (May 2010)

Publisher's summary:

Imagining vampires at the heart of the social struggles of 1920s, Moonshine blends a tempestuous romance with dramatic historical fiction, populated by a lively mythology inhabiting the gritty New York City streets.

Zephyr Hollis is an underfed, overzealous social activist who teaches night school to the underprivileged of the Lower East Side. Strapped for cash, Zephyr agrees to help a student, the mysterious Amir, who proposes she use her charity worker cover to bring down a notorious vampire mob boss. What he doesn’t tell her is why. Soon enough she’s tutoring a child criminal with an angelic voice, dodging vampires high on a new blood-based street drug, and trying to determine the real reason behind Amir’s request—not to mention attempting to resist his dark, inhuman charm.

Read the first chapter of Moonshine.

Visit Alaya Dawn Johson's website.

Sins of the Heart by Eve Silver (August 2010)

Publisher's Summary:

Half-human, half-god, Dagan Krayl is the Underworld’s most powerful soul reaper. When one of his brothers is murdered, Dagan must use every ounce of his power to hunt down those responsible for his brutal death. But he must move swiftly—and carefully—if he’s to have any chance of resurrecting his brother.

Yet that resurrection could wreak havoc on the mortal world. As an Otherkin, Roxy Tam has sworn to protect the human race and it’s her mission to stop Dagan. But when she sees him face to face, she realizes that she has seen him once before—a meeting that changed her life forever.

Neither Dagan nor Roxy expect to join forces for the sake of mankind. Or have their loyalties tested as they struggle against the potent desire that threatens to consume them both….

Read an excerpt of Sins of the Heart.
Visit Eve Silver's website.

Blood Song by Cat Adams (June 2010)

Publisher's Description:

Bodyguard Celia Graves has definitely accepted her share of weird assignments, both human and supernatural. But her newest job takes the cake. Guarding a Prince from terrorists and religious fundamentalists is hard enough, but it seems like the entire supernatural world is after this guy too. When she is betrayed by those she is employed to help, and everything goes horribly wrong, Celia wakes to find herself transformed.

Neither human nor vampire, Celia has become an Abomination—something that should not exist—and now both human and supernatural alike want her dead. With the help of a few loyal friends—a sexy mage, a powerful werewolf, and a psychic cop—Celia does her best to stay alive. On the run from her enemies, Celia must try to discover who is behind her transformation…before it’s too late.
 Visit Cat Adam's website.

The Better Part of Darkness by Kelly Gay (2009)

Publisher's Description:

Atlanta: it's the promised city for the off-worlders, foreigners from the alternate dimensions of heaven-like Elysia and hell-like Charbydon. Some bring good works and miracles. And some bring unimaginable evil...

Charlie Madigan is a divorced mother of one, and a kick-ass cop trained to take down the toughest human and off-world criminals. She's recently returned from the dead after a brutal attack, an unexplained revival that has left her plagued by ruthless nightmares and random outbursts of strength that make doing her job for Atlanta P.D.'s Integration Task Force even harder. Since the Revelation, the criminal element in Underground Atlanta has grown, leaving Charlie and her partner Hank to keep the chaos to a dull roar.

But now an insidious new danger is descending on her city with terrifying speed, threatening innocent lives: a deadly, off-world narcotic known as ash. Charlie is determined to uncover the source of ash before it targets another victim -- but can she protect those she loves from a force more powerful than heaven and hell combined?

Read Chapter One of The Better Part of Darkness.
Visit Kelly Gay's website.


Have a great Fourth of July weekend!

GRATUITOUS VIDEOS OF THE DAY

Friday is potluck.  Let's see what I can find.

Okay, this song can even make Twilight look good.



So, I'm writing a Scottish romance story for an anthology. Stop laughing. Someone asked what I knew about Scottish romances. I said, "I know who Gerald Butler is." Consider this part of my research.



I also know that David Tennant is Scottish.

Happy Thursday, Fab Vampire Videos, Contest Weiners!

First, I want to say that I got some great news yesterday from my agent.  I cannot share it until it's official, but I'm definitely happy.  You can tell, because I told The Husband, "I'm definitely happy."

I will share more news anon.

CONTEST WEINER:  Wow, lots of entries in my Three Year Bloggoversary!  The winner of the random drawing for either Casa Dracula books 1-3 OR a galley of Haunted Honeymoon is:

KATIEBABS!

Congrats, Katie, and please email me and tell me your mailing address and choice of prize.

Katie is also a reviewer and writer.  At Babbling About Books, she reviews romance, young adult, GLBT, and horror, categories that cover many urban fantasies and paranormals.  I like her photos of Mho, the stuffed lamb and books.  Mho seems well read.

Katie also writes as KT Grant and she's just released a steamy lesbilicious novel, Lovestruck and on August 1, she releases For the Love of Molly, a book about the important relationship between a girl and her hawt masseuse.

You can find out more about Katie's fiction at her author's blog.

How chic are vampires these days?  (We'll be with the vamps after the media frenzy moves on to something else.)  Chic enough for Vanity Fair to interview Charlaine Harris, author of the Southern Vampire books, which are now called the True Blood or Sookie Stackhouse books.  I can't keep track.  It's an interesting interview and Charlaine says:

Asexual vampires are strictly kid stuff, according to Harris, who points out that her books predated those of Twilight author Stephenie Meyer by several years. “My books are just aimed at adults. There’s not the fairy-tale aspect in my books that there is in hers,” says Harris. “Her books are very Romeo and Juliet; I think mine definitely aren’t.” She adds, “How are they different? Bill turns out to be betraying Sookie the whole time. Sookie finds that out and it’s devastating to her. But this leaves her to look in many different directions for love.”

Well… and sex: Sookie’s carnal forays into the supernatural lead to some pretty explicit bodice-ripping. In Harris’s pages, when heaving, virginal bosoms are pressed against cold, marble-like chests, things don’t stop there. Few details are omitted, and sometimes it gets downright gymnastic. Contrast this with Twilight’s Edward and Bella, who ends up preggers when they finally consummate, a zillion pages into the series. Harris declined to elaborate on other differences: “You can talk to Stephenie Meyer about her books. I’m not her critic. I’m glad she’s been successful.”

Whoa, Jeaniene Frost gets to guest blog today at CNN about why women find vampires hot:

 What is it about these anti-heroes that make them so appealing? Is it their good looks --show me an ugly one, and I'll show you a true rarity -- or is something else?

Yes, it's the looks.  You don't hear women pining for Nosferatu:  "Ooh, his teeth are so spiky and that misshapen bald noggin is just dreamy!  I just swoon when he touches me with those dirty pointy fingernails and no one else can carry off a long sort of dress-thing like Nos.  I deeply heart him!"

To most fans of the current trend, eternal life and a bad boy rep are only appealing if the vamp is a looker. To others, the appeal goes a bit deeper and maybe we'll talk about that tomorrow.

GRATUITOUS VIDEOS OF THE DAY

Yesterday while I was searching for the kick-ass chicks of vampiredom vids, I found these fab videos.  I just think they're all really good and hope you enjoy them! This montage by DarkCopyCat is really beautifully done and shows the dangerous appeal.

Here's a really good one by Justearingmywings1.



And the real reason women love immortal characters: because they understand fashion trends.



Somehow that led me to this. Disco and vampires are always a classic combination.