Adventures in vampirism

So, I’m really enjoying writing The Glass Floor, despite the fact that my agent tells me vampires are passe and difficult to find a home for. And despite the fact that I said I would never write vampires, ever ever.

I should know better by now than to say things like that. It’s like a challenge to my muse. The beloved pesky creature pricks up its ears and goes “What’s that you say? You’ll never write vampires because you can’t see what’s so attractive about snogging a corpse? You strange person! I can see a dozen ways of writing a vampire story that don’t involve necrophilia, and now I’m going to suggest all of them to you, just to show you I can.”

If nothing else, the urge to write proper, traditional vampires has lead me to learn all sorts of things about Romania that I never knew before. I do like the armchair travel aspect of being a writer. There is nothing like researching a book to make you realise how wide and whacky this world of ours is, and how ignorant I am about most of it.

It also makes me appreciate Bram Stoker’s artistry in creating atmosphere in Dracula – the things he left out, and the things he infodumped. When I read his book, it does not come with Ottoman, Austrian and Russian politics. You’d never guess the Romanian princes were Greek servants of the Turkish empire imposed on them from outside, or that the country had been an Ottoman protectorate for centuries. All of which I find in equal parts fascinating and a bit too complex to easily get my head around.

Dracula comes equipped with a mental spooky soundtrack, including wolves howling and creaking doors, and possibly a lone, wailing violin in a minor key.

Mine will come with Romanian folk music, for the lulz (and the contrast.) I bet you never associated vampires with this

 

And yet from now on I always will. Oh Radu, no wonder you are angry all the time. You have a lot to put up with!

Mirrored from Alex Beecroft - Author of Gay Historical and Fantasy Fiction.