Paranormal Romance: Vampires, Ghosts and Werewolves Optional
Writing fiction together and staying in love for more than a decade leads us to the inescapable conclusion that all romances are paranormal.
Note: Kathleen and I wrote this for the All Things Paranormal blog.
Paranormal (from the Greek for “beyond”) is a term typically applied to experiences that lie outside normal experiences or current scientific explanation. Lately, the word is often paired up with “romance” to characterize a kind of fiction that features elements of the supernatural. (Shameless plug: A perfect example is The Cowboy and the Vampire). As paranormal romance authors, we love the depth, intrigue and sensuality of these Gothic elements, but lately we’ve been wondering if the title is a bit misleading.
What romance isn’t paranormal?
For anyone lucky enough to experience a romantic attraction, it’s anything but normal. It makes your heart do funny things like skip beats or speed up, it makes you weak in the knees, it makes you do crazy stunts, and it physically hurts you when you’re not with the person you love. Romantic relationships almost by definition are beyond “normal.” Even though scientists may perfectly understand what’s causing all the various chemical and physiological reactions, they will likely never understand why the body goes haywire when certain pairs of eyes meet across the room.
We are still caught up in a paranormal romance some 15 years after our eyes first met across the stainless steel counter at a busy vegetarian restaurant. It was Kathleen’s first day as a waitress and Clark was working as a sous-chef in the kitchen. There above the rosemary chicken and Hungarian mushroom soup, our eyes met, our souls collided and our poor bodies experienced all sorts of unexpected reactions from floods of endorphins to swarms of stomach butterflies. Obviously, paranormal forces were at work. We never stood a chance.
Even though it took a few tries, and several years, to get all of that energy under control and focused into a relationship, being together today still feels like something way, way beyond normal.
And writing helps.
We write together as a team. The Cowboy and the Vampire came out of the recognition that there was something magical about our relationship. Two creative people from opposite worlds — Kathleen was born and raised in the heart of Washington, DC, Clark in the wide open spaces of Montana — with vastly different backgrounds (Clark grew up hunting and reading Louis L’Amour, Kathleen grew up marching in protests and reading Susan Sontag) coming together in a passionate cataclysm …
The clash of cultures love story at the heart of our own relationship carried over into The Cowboy and the Vampire. A good old boy, Tucker, falls for an ambitious city girl, Lizzie, who just happens to be a Vampire (even though she doesn’t know it yet). Even though they have nothing in common, the “paranormal” part of their romance gives them the power and conviction to face down all odds, including a horde of evil Vampires bent on their destruction.
Surviving against all odds and in spite of the natural tendency for things to degrade and decay is what any romance is about.
It’s not all roses and poetry and swirling supernatural energies for us. We have our share of “normal” fights. For example, Clark readily admits to flossing too loudly and vigorously. Kathleen has a low tolerance for loud, vigorous flossing. After many ridiculous fights, Clark now flosses in the hall and that entire sequence made it into the sequel we are currently working on, Blood and Whiskey as Tucker and Lizzie come to grips with their new life:
“All I really want is to have our baby and grow old with you and fight about stupid stuff like why you floss so goddamn loudly. But that’s not going to happen, is it? I can’t grow old, I can’t have a normal life, I can’t not kill people and the only possible solution I can think of is to just take my own life and be done with it. Is that what you want?”
Her fury subsided and she focused on the French fries suffocating under a congealing mass of brown gravy, stabbing them angrily with a fork. The silence stretched on between them until Tucker took a deep breath. “I really floss too loud?”
She choked out a sound that was half laughter and half anguish. “Yes, you do. It sounds likes you’re playing the violin with your teeth. But I don’t care. I mean, I do care, it drives me batty, but those are the kinds of things I want to fight about, not all of these huge, ridiculous things impossible things like how do I keep the Serpents from killing off humans and who do I feed on to stay alive without feeling like a sadistic freak. Mostly I can’t bear it that you think I’m some kind of monster.”
Flossing aside, we are happy to be part of a relationship that exists far beyond the normal. It’s a paranormal relationship, but aren’t they all?
Note: Kathleen and I wrote this for the All Things Paranormal blog.
Paranormal (from the Greek for “beyond”) is a term typically applied to experiences that lie outside normal experiences or current scientific explanation. Lately, the word is often paired up with “romance” to characterize a kind of fiction that features elements of the supernatural. (Shameless plug: A perfect example is The Cowboy and the Vampire). As paranormal romance authors, we love the depth, intrigue and sensuality of these Gothic elements, but lately we’ve been wondering if the title is a bit misleading.
What romance isn’t paranormal?
For anyone lucky enough to experience a romantic attraction, it’s anything but normal. It makes your heart do funny things like skip beats or speed up, it makes you weak in the knees, it makes you do crazy stunts, and it physically hurts you when you’re not with the person you love. Romantic relationships almost by definition are beyond “normal.” Even though scientists may perfectly understand what’s causing all the various chemical and physiological reactions, they will likely never understand why the body goes haywire when certain pairs of eyes meet across the room.
We are still caught up in a paranormal romance some 15 years after our eyes first met across the stainless steel counter at a busy vegetarian restaurant. It was Kathleen’s first day as a waitress and Clark was working as a sous-chef in the kitchen. There above the rosemary chicken and Hungarian mushroom soup, our eyes met, our souls collided and our poor bodies experienced all sorts of unexpected reactions from floods of endorphins to swarms of stomach butterflies. Obviously, paranormal forces were at work. We never stood a chance.
Even though it took a few tries, and several years, to get all of that energy under control and focused into a relationship, being together today still feels like something way, way beyond normal.
And writing helps.
We write together as a team. The Cowboy and the Vampire came out of the recognition that there was something magical about our relationship. Two creative people from opposite worlds — Kathleen was born and raised in the heart of Washington, DC, Clark in the wide open spaces of Montana — with vastly different backgrounds (Clark grew up hunting and reading Louis L’Amour, Kathleen grew up marching in protests and reading Susan Sontag) coming together in a passionate cataclysm …
The clash of cultures love story at the heart of our own relationship carried over into The Cowboy and the Vampire. A good old boy, Tucker, falls for an ambitious city girl, Lizzie, who just happens to be a Vampire (even though she doesn’t know it yet). Even though they have nothing in common, the “paranormal” part of their romance gives them the power and conviction to face down all odds, including a horde of evil Vampires bent on their destruction.
Surviving against all odds and in spite of the natural tendency for things to degrade and decay is what any romance is about.
It’s not all roses and poetry and swirling supernatural energies for us. We have our share of “normal” fights. For example, Clark readily admits to flossing too loudly and vigorously. Kathleen has a low tolerance for loud, vigorous flossing. After many ridiculous fights, Clark now flosses in the hall and that entire sequence made it into the sequel we are currently working on, Blood and Whiskey as Tucker and Lizzie come to grips with their new life:
“All I really want is to have our baby and grow old with you and fight about stupid stuff like why you floss so goddamn loudly. But that’s not going to happen, is it? I can’t grow old, I can’t have a normal life, I can’t not kill people and the only possible solution I can think of is to just take my own life and be done with it. Is that what you want?”
Her fury subsided and she focused on the French fries suffocating under a congealing mass of brown gravy, stabbing them angrily with a fork. The silence stretched on between them until Tucker took a deep breath. “I really floss too loud?”
She choked out a sound that was half laughter and half anguish. “Yes, you do. It sounds likes you’re playing the violin with your teeth. But I don’t care. I mean, I do care, it drives me batty, but those are the kinds of things I want to fight about, not all of these huge, ridiculous things impossible things like how do I keep the Serpents from killing off humans and who do I feed on to stay alive without feeling like a sadistic freak. Mostly I can’t bear it that you think I’m some kind of monster.”
Flossing aside, we are happy to be part of a relationship that exists far beyond the normal. It’s a paranormal relationship, but aren’t they all?
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