The Vampire Angel Viking Romance, A Novel

[Datepalm]

This a bit longer than I usually quote, but tell me, what part of the following three paragraphs would you take out?

“I need to taste you,” Vikar said and almost immediately wished he’d bitten his tongue, except his fool fangs had come out in anticipation of—what else?—a taste.

Son of a troll! How he hated these fangs! They were embarrassing, really. And inconvenient. In fact, they seemed to have a mind of their own. Like another part of his body.

But wait. Something strange was happening here. The air fair crackled, and he could swear his skin tingled. Tingled, for the love of a cloud! Every hair on his body was standing at attention, like bloody antennae.

Sandra Hill once met subtext. She killed it with an axe. Sandra Hill is way too fucking cool to do subtext. When Sandra Hill wants to hint at penis, Sandra Hill says penis. We can all only admire.

So I assume when she says antennae...she means antennae. Viking Vampire Angel Construction Worker Surfer Transformer Insenct-Man! With great hair.

There is a hilarious misunderstanding where Alex think's Vikar was offering cunnilingus while in fact he was offering to suck her blood. I mean, obviously. Natural that would happen, really. It leads to Alex threatening to attack him with a can of mace, albeit first telling him she will, and then lengthily rummaging through her purse to find it while he admired her cleavage.

(For those concerned, we find out at this point Alex has reddish blonde hair and nice cleavage.)

The Vikar finally introduces himself,

“I’m a Viking vampire angel. A vangel. My six brothers and I, Norsemen to the bone, are called The Seven, or the VIK. I am the oldest, but not by much. We seven are leaders of the vangels.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Are journalists usually so cynical . . . and rude.”

Alex feels absolutely terrible about being such a cynic.

He shook her hand, but only lightly, fearing a recurrence of the erotic current that flowed betwixt them

You should get that checked out. Whether at your doctor's or at your mechanic's is up to you.

Vikar isn't there to chat though! He has to find out if Alex has been infected by a demon, and for that he needs to, yes, taste her blood. He considers explaining some of this or asking her, but gets bored with that train of thought and forcibly grabs and bites her instead.

The taste of her washed over him like a tidal wave. His cock shot up without warning and he went lance hard without any forewarning. It was a thickening so exquisitely orgasmic that he felt his knees begin to buckle.

Sexy.

Despite apparently not feeling a need to explain his particular lifestyle choices and just bite her instead, Vikar now sits down to explain all his particular lifestyle choices, Urgent-Demon-Infestation forgotten in light of...

She put a hand to the bite mark on her neck, but the way she rubbed it was almost a caress.

Which caused the air to crackle again and ripples of electricity to shoot right to . . .

Down, thickening! Down!

A question that I can only ponder philosophically, is why a book that clearly does not need recourse to euphemism, nevertheless goes to the effort of giving us thickening? Survey: is it the worst euphemism for erection ever? Or only in books featuring construction workers?

When VIkar gets his mind...er, unthickened, he informs Alex that she is indeed demon-infected, due to having been bitten by a Lucipire. But! Lucipires only bite those who have sinned! So he asks Alex what Mortal Sins she has committed.

No longer poleaxed, she was now pole-stiff.

Is that also a euphemism?

Anyway, Vikar basically kidnaps her so he can work on having her avoid her soon to be committed sin. (Lucipires can sense schemed sins too, apparently) Like...he's her Guardian Angel! Alex is all spunky, and demands a drink, and yet seems to have no problem being, you know, locked up in the Hotel California. But first they talk some more about Vikars hair. We haven't heard about it in four paragraphs or so, after all.

“M’lady! We are Vikings. We practically invented beer."

[PaulineMRoss]

:shocked: and :thumbsup:. Carry on.

This. Surely this is the Best. Thread. Ever. My husband keeps asking me why I'm laughing, and how can I possibly explain?

So... carry on, people.

[MinDonner]

Whoa whoa whoa. Firstly, I am laughing very hard at the above. That quote about the immediate lance-hard erection thickening was a thing of risible joy. But secondly, and given the vast importance of Vik's hair, which is now apparently making like antennae... is he now looking like Yahoo Serious, turquoise beads and all? I guess with all that static electricity crackling around, it's possible, but I'm just not seeing the hawtness...

[Maithanet]

Tingled, for the love of a cloud! Every hair on his body was standing at attention, like bloody antennae.

Pure. Gold.

So many things wrong with just two sentences.

"For the love of a cloud"? These trampires are into some really kinky stuff.

Bloody antennae? Are these Vikings British? I hope so.

I also can't help but point out that antennae do not stand at attention. Unless he means a radio antennae, which he probably uses to pick up Michael Jackson tunes.

[Chaldanya]

Thickening!!!?!!?

Oh that is just priceless. All other romance novels can now stop searching in vain for the perfect euphemism. It. Has. Been. Found.

N

[Datepalm]

I was actually thinking that given the vampiric context, I might go for "clotting".

[Sci-2]

It was a thickening so exquisitely orgasmic that he felt his knees begin to buckle.

:eek: I don't think you can come from getting hard?

[Maltaran]

I now want to use "son of a troll" the next time a client annoys me.

[Vampire Squid]

Strangely enough, the Vikings did actually take good care of their hair. There's a quote somewhere about those bloody Norsemen luring good English women away from their husbands via their regularly combed locks.

Also seventy virgin Valkyries what the fuck what the actual fuck.

[Galactus]

Wait, "Vangel" isn't just something you made up, a fan-nickname? She ACTUALLY CALLS THEM VANGELS!?

[Datepalm]

Oh yes.

Any weird, mocking name I use - 90% it's coming straight from the book. Vangels. Lucipires. Jasper.

ETA - come to think of it, how would you - yes, you - pronounce "Vangel"? Is it Van-gel, like Van Halen, or is it V-angel, like Oy, Vey? I imagine we can expect an appearance from Van Halen, actually.

[Maithanet]

ETA - come to think of it, how would you - yes, you - pronounce "Vangel"? Is it Van-gel, like Van Halen, or is it V-angel, like Oy, Vey? I imagine we can expect an appearance from Van Halen, actually.

I would go with VAINgel, which works because their obsession with sex and hair products is quite vain.

[Antonius Pius]

...immediate lance-hard thickening...

Epic. Just epic.

:eek: I don't think you can come from getting hard?

Chicken and the egg, eh?

[Datepalm]

“Ha, ha, ha!” he said. “You have much to learn, wench. Much!”

Alex is sure he's just making vague threats to, um, threaten her into being threatened, or something, after all that grabbing and biting, so she decides she's just going to flow with the whole kidnapped thing. Besides, her finely honed journalistic instincts are abuzz that something strange might be going on! She decides to do some goddamned investigative reporting worthy of a Pulitzer nominee. In other words, she simperingly asks Vikar to give her the tour.

Then began the most bizarre trip Alex had ever taken, and she’d been in some bizarre places in her journalistic history, not least of which was interviewing Bin Laden’s daughter in a desert harem while both of them were in full purdah.

...so, um, she was in Saudi Arabia once?

The house is a pretty boring frat house with a good budget. Theres a gym with a Stairmasters and a cinema room with lots of comfy couches! And a chapel and weapons room, but frankly I think if a frat house could put in a weapons room, they would. It is the dullest weirdest place ever, ever.

In the kitchen, they find a side of raw beef - which Vikar had earlier mocked he would have her prepare, to put her in her womanly place. I think he was just poking fun at what he perceived as her radical militant feminism, but I actually can't be sure. Now arriving at the actual artifact, I have a grim feeling she's going to end up barefoot and in the kitchen after all. But before we get to what she should be cooking, we get a little on how she should be talking:

She turned to Vikar. “Isn’t this taking steak tartare to a new level?”

There were several beats of silence in which he just stared at her, but she could see his displeasure in the tic at the side of his mouth. She’d become very cynical and sarcastic lately . . . in the past two years, specifically. Not a very attractive trait, she had to admit. Maybe she’d gone too far this time.

Indeed. Steak tartare. A new low of the jaded cynicism eating away at her soul since the brutal murder of her family. Straight out of Dostoyevski, this one. Then Vikar is very slightly sarcastic right back at her. Things are tense between them.

Then Lizzie Borden shows up.

Just then a heavyset, older woman bustled in from the back door. She wore Victorian upper-class attire, a fringed, black silk shawl over a white, high-necked, lace-trimmed, mutton-sleeved blouse that was tucked into a full-length black skirt.

“Miss Borden, thank God!” Vikar said, going over to give her a hug. “We expected you two days ago.”

“Stuck in Portland. A male prostitute there was a bugger to save.”

Read that last line over a few times. It took me a while to get it, but Sandra Hill makes sure we don't miss it by having the characters laugh at their own jokes. I just thought i'd make sure none of you good people miss the whole experience.

Having bustled in, Lizzy Borden starts...that's right, doing the cooking. (After giving Michael Jackson Vampire a nice hug when he looks sad at the bad gay pun. Could MJ-Vangel be gay? Hint, hint?) Alex wanders around a bit and gets a beer out of the fridge, and remembers good times with the dead hubby, which, strangely, 'no longer squeezed her heart as it once had.'

Of course, that had been in the early years of their marriage. Before his betrayal.

Phew, thank goodness for that. I was worrying this was a woman who's narrative might contain two meaningful relashionships in thirty odd years. He might be tragically dead and all, but he was lame! Get Out of Grief Free Card ftw!

Trond and Vikar ask her if she's married, given her ring,

] it was none of their business whether she was married or not, and Alex really didn’t want to discuss her personal life. On the other hand, it was a common question. “I was married. My husband died."

None of their business except for the bit where she immediately tells them all about it. Vikar offers to find out if her husband is in heaven or in hell for her - sensitive, yo - and tells her about Archangel Mike being able to do that sort of thing.

The strangest, most outlandish idea occurred to her then. “Are you saying your boss is St. Michael the Archangel?”

“Precisely,” Vikar said.

Just to be clear, Alex doesn't believe him about the Vampire stuff at this point, thinking that it's all fakery, costumes and, y'know, people biting your neck. And Vik, despite having told her pretty much everything, is still pretending he's a hotel renovator for some reason. Because being an immortal Viking Vangel who's housekeeper is Lizzie Borden and who renovates hotels makes much more sense than being the above but preparing for some kind of centennial Vangel frat party.

However, when he mentions heaven and hell and her keen investigative mind connects "Archer Mike" to St. Michael she...

That's right. She faints away, dead at his feet.

[MinDonner]

Just...

...no. There are no words. :stunned:

[Datepalm]

Lizzie Borden marching in is when I moved from vague admiration to setting up a small alter in the corner to Sandra Hill, where I will sacrifice small animals and vodoo dolls made out of stuffed condoms to her. I think Lizzie Borden is way better than Faroese Fiddle Playing.

[MinDonner]

Sorry, swooned for a moment there. Lizzie Borden is an extra special addition; maybe this was part of a bet to write a book that contained a number of random celebrities drawn from a hat? I like the way that she's in Victorian dress too, just so we are clear that this is THE Lizzie Borden. WTF is she doing working (and cooking) for the Vangels anyway? Don't tell me she's sekritly a Viking too? I guess there's the axe thing...

I really, really want to make some comment about hard-bitten journalists acting in the way Our Heroine has been, but... no, still too speechless. Sandra Hill, I now suspect, may be a robot of some kind who has never quite managed to figure out human behaviour and so is just guessing. Yes. A robot programmed from a random selection of rom-coms and thewtastic 80s action fests, with an accidental copy of Thriller dropped in by mistake...

[Lummel]

who is Lizzie Borden? This is an actual person?

[Datepalm]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lizzie_Borden

Victorian Axe-Murderess extraordinaire. And yes, she is secretly a descendant of Vikings. Really.

Min - there was a reference to the Shining in there at one point...

[Lupigis]

I still don't get it - is this book an intentional parody or not? It seems so over the top that I can't imagine anyone writing it as anything but a joke, but the covers don't send that signal at all.