Vampire Books Fans, Fangs and Writers discussion
What if the vampire is Jewish and the cross doesn't work?
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Francis wrote: "Hi Tracy & welcome - & HNYI think people generally no longer feel the connection between religion and vampires. If vampires are creatures of the dark and the Devil, then symbols of light and God ..."
Hi Francis,
I like your reasoning behind how vampires could be killed. Since they're creatures of the dark, they should be only killed by the light. My vampires could be killed by the light or fire. I could still use your reasoning with fire, since fire is also natural.
I never thought about the reasoning behind my choice of method. I'm going to steal yours. Is that okay?
Susanne
An interesting discussion. I came up with a new twist on how vampires die, but not at the hands of humans. How do vampires continue to thrive? They have to feast on the blood of humans, right? So what happens when on of the feeding teeth is lost? It's a very slow and painful death unless their clan decides to suck them dry. To add to the mayhem, what if they were able to infect their prey with a virus which would eliminate the changeling in ninety days? It results in a quick and horribly gruesome death.
Jeff wrote: "An interesting discussion. I came up with a new twist on how vampires die, but not at the hands of humans. How do vampires continue to thrive? They have to feast on the blood of humans, right? So w..."Hi Jeff,
How interesting and gruesome. How do you think up your stories? What are doing at the time? If you're mad at someone, do your vampires suffer more?
I dream up my stories late at night when it's all quiet and everyone is asleep. Then my thoughts run wild.
Susanne
Susanne wrote: "Jeff wrote: "An interesting discussion. I came up with a new twist on how vampires die, but not at the hands of humans. How do vampires continue to thrive? They have to feast on the blood of humans..."Hello Susanne, My idea actually came from two gals. I'd studied WWII for forty plus years. One gal suggested I write a WWII love story. Not happening. The other said vampires were still popular. With that information, I sat down and started hammering out a story. The actual mechanics just appeared. No pre-planning or plotting. My vampires suffer based on the flow of the story. I didn't realize one of the main characters was going to die until the next to last chapter and it wasn't who some of the readers wanted to die. So, my feelings never really come into play when I write. Call it the heat of the moment or an epiphany of sorts—character driven.
Hi Jeff,My writing also flowed out of me at different times. I had planned to write a murder mystery. It began that way until I wrote about a group of my characters who stayed indoors during the day, only to come out at night. I continued with the mystery and the paranormal. The twist and turns in the story became a reflection of my mind. I was surprised at the ending.
It feels good to share my writing with other people. Writing can be very lonely.
Susanne
Susanne wrote: "Hi Jeff,My writing also flowed out of me at different times. I had planned to write a murder mystery. It began that way until I wrote about a group of my characters who stayed indoors during the d..."
Yes it can Susanne.
I love reading about how other authors get inspired and work their craft.I always know my endpoint, and I try to stick with my outline, but after I start typing the characters take over and go where they want. I always get to the last scene, the one I initially envisioned, but the route to it never follows my plan.
Tracy wrote: "I love reading about how other authors get inspired and work their craft.I always know my endpoint, and I try to stick with my outline, but after I start typing the characters take over and go wh..."
Hi Tracy,
My characters become very real to me that I could envision what they would do or say next.
That is why I couldn't understand when two reviewers on Goodreads had said that my characters had no depth. To me, they were as real as the person sitting next to me.
Susanne
Tracy wrote: "I love reading about how other authors get inspired and work their craft.I always know my endpoint, and I try to stick with my outline, but after I start typing the characters take over and go wh..."
I've been trying to outline the follow-up to my book, but that hinders me to write freely. I work full-time so the freedom to write as often as possible doesn't come easy. But if pantsing works, then so be it!
Susanne wrote: "Tracy wrote: "I love reading about how other authors get inspired and work their craft.I always know my endpoint, and I try to stick with my outline, but after I start typing the characters take ..."
Susanne, from the reviews I read, I believe the reviewers are alluding the idea of the psyche of the characters. The descriptions appear to be right on, but how they actually think, feel and react could be the issue. Other than that, looks like you have a winner.
Hi Jeff,Thanks for the support. I didn't make my characters deep thinkers. They are silly twenty year old kids who try to save their town all by themselves. If Brad Meltzer's characters didn't mess up, then he wouldn't have any books.
After this series, I will try a more serious book. I'm a too serious person. That's why I like to read lighter books--like mysteries and thrillers.
Thanks again,
Susanne
Some reviewers of my Suzie & the Monsters complain that Suzie is superficial, which baffles me. Yes she loves sex & shopping rather more than the average vamp, but the whole point of the book was to create a deeply emotional vampire with a detailed history. So I really don't understand where 'superficial' comes from unless it just means 'I didn't like her'. After all, many of these reviewers will happily give five stars to books that, to my mind, are extremely formulaic.
Francis,I agree. One reviewer doesn't like my main character's love interest. He's too egotistical and stiff. Of course he is, he's a vampire!
One person made fun that my characters are all good-looking. The ones who are vampires should be good-looking and other worldly.
That is why I'm sticking with reviewers of mysteries and the paranormal. They understand that the plot and the mystery is very important. And twists and turns in the plot are good.
This has been a long, painful process for me. But I'm coming to terms with it.
Susanne
Hi Susanne,I think Jeff's comment is a good one. We know our characters' minds so well, we sometimes lose track of the fact that folks coming to the material for the first time may not be able to see the subtext.
Like Francis says, too, not every character is going to be liked by everyone. Whenever I suggest Stephen King for my book club the reaction is usually negative.
Tracy wrote: "Hi Susanne,I think Jeff's comment is a good one. We know our characters' minds so well, we sometimes lose track of the fact that folks coming to the material for the first time may not be able to ..."
Thank you Tracy. In the vampire book I wrote, there is one character readers have hated from the git-go. I didn't even like him, but I found out it was critical to the story. Another interesting caveat I ran across was, I didn't develop the characters per-se. They introduced themselves and showed me their unique characteristics, whether they were adult of children. Fascinating! I definitely wouldn't invite any of them over for dinner. I fear I would be on the menu.
Tracy wrote: "Hi Susanne,I think Jeff's comment is a good one. We know our characters' minds so well, we sometimes lose track of the fact that folks coming to the material for the first time may not be able to ..."
Yep, I agree, Tracy. It could also be maybe we didn't explain it thoroughly enough. We think we did, but others may not agree.
I think its best to keep in mind that we're doing something very subjective and not everyone is going to like our work. I mean, I don't like everything I read. Some of the fiction books I read last year weren't that great to me, yet others loved them.
Hi,I am reading a book called Whitby After Dark - Volume 1. It is written by new author Stella Coulson. I'm really enjoying it. It has a different take on the usual vampire story. Here, the demon is a serial killer. That's a new twist.
Susanne
Thanks for the mention Susanne. The Vampires of my book - Don't burn up but rather be weakened by sunlight, Don't have to invited in, only silver, beheading & taking out the heart, fire can kill a vampire. The Vampires have to of Vampire heritage in order to Awaken their Vampire Gene. Any human without the Vampire Gene cannot be turned and will eventually die. Magic exists in the world but only a small percentage of the population can harness it. Witches in the world are human but have a genetic predisposition to energy manipulation and may have other supernatural traits, but or not immortal.
I rather enjoyed Susanne Liest novel by the way. I recommend it. It's worth a read. Very sinister and enjoyable.
Nottelling wrote: "Spoiler ahead! There is a Jewish vampire in The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare."That's cool. My favorite character is the Warlock character Magnus, he's very flamboyant and witty. I liked the fact that that that YA paranormal had characters of different sexuality. Friends of mine who are gay liked this as most end to have then be straight white self hating type. Okay Magnus is a Warlock not a Vamp, but it's good to see a character in YA paranormal who isn't Caucasian, and Asian is bisexual. I think the genre could benefit from having more color and variety.
Hi, I've enjoyed reading all the comments about realistic vampires and humor. I have just set up a Pinterest page for my vampire book series, New Vampires.http://www.pinterest.com/sanfransumme...Carol Lightwood (Annie Carroll)
Annie wrote: "Hi, I've enjoyed reading all the comments about realistic vampires and humor. I have just set up a Pinterest page for my vampire book series, New Vampires.http://www.pinterest.com/sanfransumme......"Hi Annie,
I tried to access your Pinterest page but I couldn't. Is it private?
Susanne
Thanks for being so helpful, Francis. The Pinterest page is not private, Suzanne. The title of the board is New Vampires.Carol
Annie wrote: "Thanks for being so helpful, Francis. The Pinterest page is not private, Suzanne. The title of the board is New Vampires.Carol"
Hi Annie,
I followed you back.
Susanne
Annie wrote: "Hi, I've enjoyed reading all the comments about realistic vampires and humor. I have just set up a Pinterest page for my vampire book series, New Vampires.http://www.pinterest.com/sanfransumme......"Cool Pinterest board, Annie! I'm following it now, and it will serve as an inspiration for my Pinterest page for my book, "The Dark Proposal". I've been meaning to do it, but wasn't so sure on which pics should go in.
As for the sexuality of my vampires, I have them as basically hedonistic with fluid sexuality. There's no pregnancy or STIs, so that allows a more free-love world. Plus, they live in their own world separate from humans for centuries, so the human attitude toward sexuality is not the same. I was inspired by Anne Rice, who's vampires are often bisexual.
I have fertile vampires, infertile vampires, occasionally fertile, straight, lesbian, bisexual, othersexual, etc. So much fun writing vampire stories...
I think Vampires would be fluid in terms of sexuality. Some may have more of an attraction to one type or types over another, but essentially their sexuality is far to evolved to even care. Even in classic Vampire literature, the Vampires have an ambiguous sexuality from Lord Ruthven from John William Polidori's The Vampyre: A Taleto Marcilla/Carmilla from Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla. Some contemporary paranormal Authors have fluid Vampires, prime example being Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles novels.
Polidori's vampire was based on Byron, of course, who was bisexual. Coleridge's lesbian vampire poem Christabel (1800) is an allegory about the relationship between Coleridge and Wordsworth.Carmilla's ambiguous sexuality seems more natural to us today, but is part of a long tradition of associating evil with 'unnatural' sexuality.
I wrote a trio of blog posts about vampire sexuality:
The Bisexual Question
The Bisexual Examiner
Pansensual, Non-bisexual Vampires
I should also include this post:
The Female Vampire
I don't think using a different symbol would prevent the deity from using his power.
Vampire Books Fans, Fangs and Writers
Books mentioned in this topic
The Vampyre (other topics)Carmilla (other topics)
Whitby After Dark - Volume 1 (other topics)
Whitby After Dark - Volume 1 (other topics)
Whitby After Dark - Volume 1 (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
John William Polidori (other topics)J. Sheridan Le Fanu (other topics)
Anne Rice (other topics)
Cassandra Clare (other topics)
Cassandra Clare (other topics)
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For me, vulnerability in antagonists and protagonists is essential in the story, so although being a vampire must have advantages, the X-Men model doesn't work for me either. And, yes, I have to say, hold the garlic, too. It's a bit old-fashioned.
Many writers seem to feel constrained by the traditional boundaries of what a vampire can and can't do and so break the "rules". I think there are still many stories to tell within those boundaries and find it challenges me when I do have to think "inside" the box, so to speak.