Well, now I have one. And I also have Syrie James' novel Dracula, My Love, which I'm hoping is not a trashy romance. It's supposed to be the secret journals of Mina Murray Harker, one of the main characters in Bram Stoker's Dracula, chronicling her love for both her husband and the Count.
And because I just couldn't help myself, I picked up Dracula: The Un-Dead. I didn't realize until I got it home that it was co-written by the great-grandnephew of Bram himself. It picks up 25 years after the original and follows the story of Mina's son Quincey as he discovers the Dracula story (and his parents' history) for the first time.
It's dangerous to mess with something considered classic. Elizabeth Kostova did fairly well with The Historian, but she did something unique in that she took the Count and reminded us that his history is anything but fiction. And she good tepid reviews.
There's tons of vampire fiction out there right now. The Books of Which We Do Not Speak Because the Vampires Sparkle have sold a bazillion copies (thought the movies continue to get worse). Another little young-adult series, The House of Night, has its eighth book due out in January. I looked briefly at Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. I don't know that I'm ready for it. Maybe after I get through the ones I bought today. Variety says the movie's already in pre-production with Tim Burton's name attached to it. What's more October than a vampire movie with a Tim Burton credit?
The vampires once relegated to a couple weeks at the end of October, are everywhere. Year-round, they're everywhere. True Blood, Vampire Diaries, the American remake of "Let the Right Ones In". You can't get away from them.
This all brings me back to where I was twenty years ago. I hadn't yet read Stoker and was just starting to read Anne Rice. I didn't see it coming just yet. I didn't imagine the nights when I would read Dracula on my break at work and then have to run from my car to the house when I got home because I was so freaked out. I didn't foresee my world filling with vampires.
I've been writing them for years now. Quite poorly, mind you, mostly because I haven't ever really put my heart into it. I think I'm finally ready. After all the vamp-schlock that's been unleashed on us over the last, what, five years? I'm ready. And I've got an angle I finally feel good about.
I'm reclaiming the vampires. Watch out, Edward Cullen. I'm coming for you.
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