Vampires

[Galactus]

Now, as we know Our Vampires are Different but which kinds of vampires do you like?

Personally I have a hard time likintg the less explicitly supernatural vampires, or the ones that are decoupled from christianity. One of the more powerful images of the vampire I think is that of an anathema. Something that is completely at odds with the way humanity works. (Humans are active by day, vampires at night, vampires live by taking human lives, what humans hold sacred is painful to vampires...) I don't really care for "vampire as apex predator" thing, but more as "vampire as something almost human but quite alien to humanity".

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

I'm pretty tired of them. The idea Bram Stoker created surrounding vampires being a symbol of sexual deviancy and anti-morality is probably the best incarnation, but thats been very played out. I wish folks would let them RIP for a while personally.

[Datepalm]

I rather like my vampires tied up with romance/lust, to be honest. Love as obssesive, destructive and dangerous is where the trope comes most into its own for me. (So while twilight isn't exactly my cup of tea, I can actually rather respect its use of vampires.) I do like some nice, gothic christianity as much as anyone, but I usually tend not to notice it unless its unsubtle to the point of cheese, I'm afraid. (Et tu, Narnia?)

Vampires as an unmystical sort of regualr species don't do much for me, nor do complex vampire societies - we have werewolves for the former, and the interesting issue is the relationship to humans and humanity for the latter.

[Migey]

The way people are doing them these days, i hate vampires.

In fact, the only vampires i really like are Sergei Lukyanenko's ones. He was written a 4 book series called 'The Night Watch'. Vampires arnt the main focus of it, but vampires are in it, and his vampires are very good and beleivable, although its a shame because there is alot of discrimination against them in his books.

If your looking for some interesting vampires, try the first book, which is called, after the series, 'The Night Watch'. Its set in Russia, and the plot can be really hard to follow, but its an amazing book, although the writing style is a bit strange. Some of the characters are really likeable though. Semyon <3 . It is written very, very well and all of the characters are beleiveable. The only bad thing about the series is that its too short. 4 books, and each only around 500-600 pages long.

[Lichen]

One of the more powerful images of the vampire I think is that of an anathema. Something that is completely at odds with the way humanity works.

I agree. Solitary, damned, tortured souls.

Aesthetically nothing pleases me more (concerning vampires) than the corpselike, rodent-faced countenance à la Herzog's Nosferatu.

Story-wise the worst thing to do is to try to rationalize or overexplain anything related to vampires. Not to know is what makes them fascinating.

I'm not a fan of most of the modern vampires (Lugosi, Lee, Blade films, True Blood, Twilight etc). They've totally lost everything that makes them interesting.

There is an afterword by Thomas Ligotti for his story Mrs. Rinaldi's Angel (Noctuary / Ellen Datlow's A Whisper of Blood) that sums up my feelings perfectly, but it's not available online (the story is).

[Arthmail]

Vampires basically eat people. Seeing them as sexual in any way is retarded to me. Give me 30 Days of Night vampires any day. At least they make no bones about it, and aren't tortured souls blah, blah, blah.

[Vrana]

The way people are doing them these days, i hate vampires.

In fact, the only vampires i really like are Sergei Lukyanenko's ones. He was written a 4 book series called 'The Night Watch'. Vampires arnt the main focus of it, but vampires are in it, and his vampires are very good and beleivable, although its a shame because there is alot of discrimination against them in his books.

If your looking for some interesting vampires, try the first book, which is called, after the series, 'The Night Watch'. Its set in Russia, and the plot can be really hard to follow, but its an amazing book, although the writing style is a bit strange. Some of the characters are really likeable though. Semyon <3 . It is written very, very well and all of the characters are beleiveable. The only bad thing about the series is that its too short. 4 books, and each only around 500-600 pages long.

Having read the books you mention I have to say I personally found the books rather trite at times and while I did like them when I had first finished them I get the sense of having grown out of them quite a lot thinking back. The writing style wasn't so much strange as lacking in any kind of coherent exposition imho, and there was more of deus ex machina than actual plot, at least by the end which was basically a big wtf moment for me.

As far as I remember there was nothing special about the vampires, the part of them luring in by song or a calling isn't anything new, don't quote me on this though because I cannot provide a link, but I'm fairly sure of this. Each to their own I guess.

I don't think I have ever seen a rendition of vampires I like now that I think about it, but I have yet to read stoker so that could be one reason.

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

Vampires basically eat people. Seeing them as sexual in any way is retarded to me. Give me 30 Days of Night vampires any day. At least they make no bones about it, and aren't tortured souls blah, blah, blah.

They essentially exchange bodily fluids. Once this has happened, the 'innocent' becomes 'corrupted'. If that isn't a euphamism for sexual deviancy I don't know what is.

[automne]

I haven't read a lot of vampire stories.

I liked Bram Stoker's, didn't care much for Octavia Butler's, was very fond of Charlie Huston's and loved George Martin's. My favorite vampire being Joshua York, I'd vote for the vampires as an altogether different species which sees us as food.

[Turinqui-Calima]

What? No mention of Joe Pitt yet? I just started 'My Dead Body' this morning and, although I find many of the concepts kind of stupid, these are the only Vampire Books I've ever actually enjoyed.

I haven't read GRRM's yet though.

[automne]

What? No mention of Joe Pitt yet? I just started 'My Dead Body' this morning and, although I find many of the concepts kind of stupid, these are the only Vampire Books I've ever actually enjoyed.

I haven't read GRRM's yet though.

Isn't Joe Pitt Charlie Huston's very own vampire? ;)

[Arthmail]

They essentially exchange bodily fluids. Once this has happened, the 'innocent' becomes 'corrupted'. If that isn't a euphamism for sexual deviancy I don't know what is.

Depends on which tradition you follow. Many ancient notions of vampires have nothing to do with the exchanging of fluids to make more vampires.

Eating out someones throat is not sexual.

[Wastrel]

Don't see the point of writing a vampire novel right now. What can actually be added that isn't a gimick?

The problem is the whole murder thing. Vampires either:

a) kill themselves

B) live perfectly adequately off willing volunteers (boring, just another kink) or blood banks (kind of pathetic) or subject populations (basically into SF, and then why bother to make the rulers vampiric specifically?)

or c) are callous serial killers

I think a) could be done as a book, but I don't see why you would (so many other reasons for suicidal tragedies, and vampirism adds nothing); the pathetic living-off-blood-banks thing could be done, but not a lot of people want to write novels where the hero is pathetic; and that leaves c). Given the many other types of serial killer, vampires are only distinct if they are genuinely alien - which moves them from protagonist to plot device.

So, I think vampires are fine as stock monsters when it doesn't really matter what the monster is, but they seem pointlessly cliche in any more central role. I'd rather see a human, or some new form of monster - even werewolves seem more, no pun intended, full of life as a genre.

Of course, if people stop going on about vampires for ten or twenty years, then there might start being some power left in the notion again. But as it is, that trope has been worn out.

[Blaine]

Eating out someones throat is not sexual.

I don't know. I can assemble at least three sex acts with that sentence. :P

[Vrana]

Don't see the point of writing a vampire novel right now. What can actually be added that isn't a gimick?

The problem is the whole murder thing. Vampires either:

a) kill themselves

B) live perfectly adequately off willing volunteers (boring, just another kink) or blood banks (kind of pathetic) or subject populations (basically into SF, and then why bother to make the rulers vampiric specifically?)

or c) are callous serial killers

I think a) could be done as a book, but I don't see why you would (so many other reasons for suicidal tragedies, and vampirism adds nothing); the pathetic living-off-blood-banks thing could be done, but not a lot of people want to write novels where the hero is pathetic; and that leaves c). Given the many other types of serial killer, vampires are only distinct if they are genuinely alien - which moves them from protagonist to plot device.

So, I think vampires are fine as stock monsters when it doesn't really matter what the monster is, but they seem pointlessly cliche in any more central role. I'd rather see a human, or some new form of monster - even werewolves seem more, no pun intended, full of life as a genre.

Of course, if people stop going on about vampires for ten or twenty years, then there might start being some power left in the notion again. But as it is, that trope has been worn out.

I dunno what you've done to piss some of the veterans or mods off (not that much in the loop) but I have to say I always enjoy reading your posts. I might not always agree but there is a high level of coherence and feeling of the text being thought through in them. +1

I haven't read all that many vamp books but I've never felt the need to either, I basically agree with wastrel's post saying. I'm going to give bram stoker a shot but don't really feel the necessity of vampires in fiction.

[Bellis]

I liked Charlie Huston's take a lot: vampyrism as a vyrus-with-a-y.

It's essentially B on Wastrel's list, and it's essentially vampires done as hardboiled crime fiction, but I found those novels quite the guilty pleasure.

I also preferred Huston's more tongue-in-cheek sci-fi explanations of vampirism to Peter Watts evolutiononsense in Blindsight.

[Poobah]

I hate vampires when they're portrayed simply as emo tragic wankers. I can appreciate why the tragic can be an appropriate approach to vampirism but I've rarely seen it done well. Vegetarian sparklies can go fuck themselves and die in a horrible horrible fire.

I don't read too much 'urban fiction' (which seems to be the most common modern way in which vamps get into fiction) because that which I have read is mostly bad vampire-porn of the worst type, excepting the dresden files and I like how Butcher does vamps there. In the more classic vein I liked Stoker's Dracula.

[Migey]

I like the way Sergei Lukyanenko did his vampires - They drink mostly donor blood, but are allowed, by law, (they get liscences) to kill humans sometimes. I also like the way that the most powerful ones can turn into animals, but they dont make a big deal out of it. (Oh god i love Kostya as a rabbit, out-jumping a train)

I also like the way that he includes vampires in his story, yet they arnt the main focus of them. Almost every book ive read that involves vampires has them as the main focus.

[moirne]

I hate any kind of vampire. This trend is so tiresome. BUT, if I am forced to pick, I prefer the vampires as villains.

[Arthmail]

I don't know. I can assemble at least three sex acts with that sentence. :P

I would not trust you in the same room with my daughter. If i had one.

I like the way Sergei Lukyanenko did his vampires - They drink mostly donor blood, but are allowed, by law, (they get liscences) to kill humans sometimes. I also like the way that the most powerful ones can turn into animals, but they dont make a big deal out of it. (Oh god i love Kostya as a rabbit, out-jumping a train)

I also like the way that he includes vampires in his story, yet they arnt the main focus of them. Almost every book ive read that involves vampires has them as the main focus.

Are you Sergei Lukyanenko? This is the second time you've shilled him on a single page.