Welcome to the Spooktacular Blog Hop! Today, I’m posting on why I love writing about vampires. Then I’m giving away an e-book bundle of all my paranormal novels (Sanguinary, Legally Undead, Waking Up Dead, and Fairy, Texas) to one lucky winner! So check out my post, leave a comment, enter to win, then HOP to the rest of entries. And have a great October!
How does a college English professor end up writing urban fantasy books about vampires?
That’s a question I get more than I expected when I first started this fiction-publishing journey.
In some ways, my interest in bloodsucking fiends is unsurprising. My academic specialty is the British eighteenth century, and the period is full of vampires, starting with the great vampire debate of 1732 (are vampires real?) and continuing through a number of stories, poems, and plays—enough to fill a book, and then some (and I’ve done just in an edited collection entitled Beyond the Count: http://bookShow.me/B00KNKOQIY)
Moreover, the eighteenth century saw the development of gothic literature, starting with Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto—and we can trace the influence of that gothic literature pretty much through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and right up to today’s urban fantasies.
So I can certainly point to some nicely academic reasons for writing a book like Sanguinary. And as my edited collection of early vampire stories illustrates, my interest in vampires is a long-standing one.
Honestly, though? I wrote these books because they are what I wanted to read.
I love urban fantasy. It’s my favorite escapist fantasy. But when I started writing urban fantasy, there weren’t nearly enough of the kinds of vampires I wanted to read about. The thing is, I like my vampires to be brutal and bloodthirsty—as much as I enjoy the recent trend toward sexy vampires (because YUM), I think there’s a reason that we, as a culture, keep coming back to the kinds of vampires who are absolute monsters. Both kinds of vampires—those we want to devour and those who want to devour us—are the expression of the human id, that part of us that is unsocialized, that wants what it wants without thought of consequence. The hot vampires of paranormal romance allow us to fantasize about one kind of unsocialized behavior. But the murderous vampires allow us to explore even darker fantasies.
The vampires in my novels don’t have a sparkle among them; they are definitely more beast than beauty—and that’s what I like best about them.
I’d love to hear from other folks, too. Tell me: What do you like best about vampires and vampire fiction? (It’s an entry on the Rafflecopter!)
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These books are included in the giveaway:
http://www.amazon.com/Legally-Undead-Vampirarchy-Book-1-ebook/dp/B00KKV44BK/
http://www.amazon.com/Fairy-Texas-Margo-Bond-Collins-ebook/dp/B00I7BTMJ4/
http://www.amazon.com/Waking-Dead-Margo-Bond-Collins-ebook/dp/B00HKQQRJA/
Words, Words, Words 
My favorite fictional vampire is Lestat. He has had my heart for a very long time now!
My favorite vampire as of now is Lestat. I’m always open to new volunteers, I haven’t read any of your books yet. 😉
I have to agree about Anne Rice’s Lestat. He was my first.
[…] 103. ~Margo Bond Collins ~ Words, Words, Words (INT) […]
My favorite vampire is Aaron (Women of the Otherworld).
Bunnicula. 😉 Thanks for the giveaway! You can enter my Spooktacular Giveaway at From the Shadows. Happy Halloween! 🙂
Anne Rice’s vampire “Lestat” is my favorite book vampire!!!
Judy Cox
Right now it is Bones from Night Huntress by Jeaniene Frost!!! *sigh*
Chanzie @ Mean Who You Are.
My favorite vampire is Lothaire from Lothaire by Kresley Cole.
jmesparza821 at gmail dot com
M
The thing I prefer in Vampire stories is the love story, that is crushes you to see the love between the two and yet it is tragic in ways.
The Vampire I like the most in books is Dracula! He is the one we all get so many of our conceptions of vampires from ( at least us old school ones).
The only vampire books I’ve read are the Twilight books. I thought they were ok, but it’s just not really my thing!
coriwestphal at msn dot com
What I like is seeing how different authors have different takes on the mythos. One can be serious, another silly. It’s cool to see the creativity of different people around one topic. My favorite fictional vampire, not sure. Dracula is the only one that really pops into my head. He kind of falls into what I was saying above – we see him pop up all over the place in books and movies, with each person portraying him slightly differently. Just interesting.
Cool that you’re a professor in English.and that you write these types of stories. It’s what gets people reading. Sure, you could write some stuffy novel, but it won’t impact as many people. You can still put your thoughts into a vampire novel. And you really should write what you’d read yourself 🙂 If you don’t like it, how can you expect others to?
Dracula
Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise’s parts in Interview w the Vampire.
Stefan from the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs and from tv Spike from Buffy/Angel.
Anne
OH that would be Lestat from Anne Rice’s books. Although I did have a soft spot for Emmett and Jasper from Twilight.
My favorite vampire is was and always shall be Lestat de Lioncourt. Merci beaucoup!
Lestat is my favorite hands down
Lestat.
Thanks for the chance to win!
Alucard from hellsing manga