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I could spend hours sharing all of my passionate arguments on the benefits of both reading and writing romance.  I could quote more market statistics.  I could quote psychologists.  I could quote Jayne Ann Krentz and remind you of the positive, life-affirming values inherent in all romances:  the celebration of female power, courage, intelligence, and gentleness; the inversion of the power structure of a patriarchal society; the psychological benefits of spending time with authors who have a positive world view.

But to be honest I’m a little sick of defending “romance” as a genre to people too obsessed with its sexual content to attempt to understand its emotional content. So if any of you are ever leered at, sneered at, or otherwise degraded for writing or reading romance, simply blink and gently say (really quickly), “What the romance novel is really all about is the archetypal human struggle of integrating the masculine and feminine aspects of our psyches.” I can promise you that nothing will shut them up faster. 

People often ask me why I write romance.  I write romance because the ever expanding boundaries of the genre allow me to express my own heartfelt beliefs in optimism, faith, honor, chivalry and the timeless power of love to provoke a happy ending.  In a society gutted by cynicism, we have found the courage to stand up and proclaim that hope isn’t corny, love isn’t an antiquated fantasy, and dreams can come true for women still willing to strive for them.

Probably the most subversive thing we dare to do is to make the woman the hero of her own story.  And to realize exactly how subversive that is, I want each of you to honestly ask yourselves if the marvelous J.K. Rowling would have been such an international success if her first book had been titled, HARRIET POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE.  Traditionally, in our mainstream patriarchal society, it’s been the male character who is allowed to go on all the thrilling physical and emotional quests.  Oh, he might have a female sidekick like the delightful Hermione Granger in HARRY POTTER, but she is rarely allowed to overstep her role as confidante and facilitator of his self-discovery.  In a romance, the heroine acts as narrator of her own story as well as driving the various plotlines that fuel that story. 

Our heroines don’t just “stand by their men”, they “stand up to them.” And guess what—their men love it!  We celebrate both a woman’s softness and her strength and introduce her to a man capable of recognizing the value of both.  Is it any wonder that both she and our readers fall in love with him? 

I write romance because a young woman in Portugal named Lourdes Goulart was praying that my next book would come out before the cancer that was ravaging her body claimed her life.  Even though chemotherapy had weakened her eyesight to the point of blindness, she sent me a beautiful and painstaking cross-stitch she’d done of a windmill she could see through the window from her bed.  Six months ago, I received word from her sister, Rosa, that Lourdes had died.  She started my new book the day before she entered the hospital for the last time, but didn’t want to read past the first page for fear of being interrupted. 

I write romance because of a call I recently received from a friend who attended nursing school with me.  She’d just undergone a total hysterectomy.  She described how depressed and emotionally empty she’d felt after the surgery and its numerous complications.  She told me that reading my latest book pulled her out of her depression and even restored the sexual desire for her husband that she had feared she would never feel again. 

I write romance because of an e-mail I recently received from a 54-year old incest survivor.  Instead of blaming her father for the terrible thing he had done to her, she had always blamed her mother for letting him do it.  Because my hero in A KISS TO REMEMBER found the grace in his soul to forgive his mother for a similar act, this woman decided, after nursing her bitterness for 50 years, to forgive her mother before she passed away from Alzheimer’s Disease. 

I’d like to share one more brief story with you:

They met in 1957 when he was twenty-two and she was eighteen.  He was a skinny, handsome G.I. with a motorcycle and a devilish twinkle in his eye.  She was his sister’s best friend.  She was beautiful, smart, and funny.  He was in love. 

He went driving along the river that dark, rainy night at nearly a hundred miles an hour--a 26 year old soldier in a foreign country with a brand new baby and a wife facing a lifetime of torturous illness and uncertainty.  He had a choice to make.  He could shuffle his baby off to be raised by relatives and abandon his wife to the care of a German mental institution.  He could drive into that river and let all of his decisions be made for him.  Or he could choose to live and fight for his family.

My parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this year.  Because my dad meant it when he said, “for better or worse; in sickness and in health,” I enjoyed a relatively stable, happy childhood and my mom’s hospitalizations were kept to a minimum.  My father’s love is as unwavering and unconditional today as it was fifty-one years ago.  Although my mother is now suffering from a rare and terminal brain disorder that has resulted in severe dementia, when my father visits her in the nursing home every other day, he still sees that beautiful, brilliant girl who won his heart all those years ago. 

So when people ask me, “Why do you write romance?”, I can only reply, “How could I not?”

Please visit me today over at http://www.facebook.com/teresamedeirosfanpage and tell me why you love to read romance!

http://www.teresamedeiros.com
You can follow Teresa on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/teresamedeiros and join her Facebook Page at: http://www.facebook.com/teresamedeirosfanpage

In 2005, we moved into our new house, and to celebrate, we got this Christmas tree. It was too tall for our great room ... and the ceiling’s 16’ 8”. Listen, don’t laugh, our friends Donna and Monty gave it to us, so it was free and we didn’t have to chop it down. Scott cut a foot off the bottom and a foot and a half off the top. We carried it in. (Our manly neighbor was conveniently not home to help, so I got elected to carry the “light” end. My contribution consisted mostly of saying, “Wait! I’m standing on a branch!")

When we stood it up, the tree hit the ceiling. So Scott got the loppers, stood on the ladder and cut off another foot and a half. Some might say it smelled like a Xmas tree in here. Actually, it smelled like the whole damned forest. We had to buy garlands, bulbs and lights (ya think?), and we risked our lives to decorate the tree by using extendo-pinchers and really tall ladders. But everyone in the family thoroughly enjoyed the tree.

So … a few days after Christmas, we invited Donna and Monty to dine with us, drink with us, and admire our gorgeous tree — and that makes the evening’s events so much more appropriate.

We were all in the great room after dinner, chatting and relaxing. Donna and I sat on the couch, Monty sat on a chair facing us, Scott was on the other couch, also facing us. The tree was off to our right. And right in the middle of the conversation, Monty who is a very erudite, articulate, learned man, suddenly shouted (and I’m quoting him exactly), “Ptrmmble! Shxzmnrt! Argk!”

Later he said he couldn’t find the right words. Actually, the appropriate phrase would have been, “Timber!”

Because the tree fell on us.

It fell in slow motion (the plastic base cracked and the half-inch metal screws in the trunk bent) so Donna and I were able to scramble out from underneath, laughing wildly. (That’s Donna holding the coffee cup and Monte holding the tree while Scott gets a rope.) The guys righted it, tied the trunk to the stair railing and we all sat down and laughed some more. And every Christmas should have a miracle — only one ornament broke!

This year, of course, we’re going to be a lot wiser about our tree. No more of the trees that touch the ceiling. We’ve learned our lesson … yeah. Right.

No matter what holiday you celebrate, I hope you have a wonderful time with family and friends and food, and may your tree always remain erect.

Warmly,
Christina Dodd
http://www.christinadodd.com

PEOPLE magazine recently named Johnny Depp the Sexiest Man Alive. What better time to choose the SEXIEST MAN DEAD?  (And no--Edward Cullen does NOT qualify this time!) Let’s forget those hot guys with their minty fresh breath and pesky pulses for a little while and harken back to days (and men) gone by.  I’m posting a few of my favorites to inspire you.  (And let me say right off the bat before anyone forgets--SEAN CONNERY IS STILL ALIVE!!!)

Has there ever been a more swoon-worthy moment in cinematic history than the one where Scarlett O’Hara looked down that long, sweeping staircase to find Rhett Butler grinning up at her?  Those sparkling eyes and that devilish grin can still take my breath away.  Clark Gable could carry me up the stairs any day!  (Or night!)

I’ve already gone on record as saying that the phone scene between Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed in IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE is the hottest love scene in history.  There are no rumpled bedsheets.  There are no naked, straining bodies.  There’s simply George Bailey and Mary Hatch sharing a phone in her mother’s living room.  An overtly hostile George is torn between his dream of escaping his hometown while there’s still time and his desperate desire for young Mary.  I don’t have to tell you which one wins and in that moment when he drops the phone and grabs Mary, the chemistry between them is so sizzling it may very well melt your heart and your DVD player.  There’s just something about a “nice guy” who seems so laid back but has such smoldering reserves of passion that I’ve always found irresistible. 

As you can probably tell from my own passion for such actors as Russell Crowe and Clive Owen, I don’t mind a face that’s been lived in a little.  I can’t even articulate why I find Humphrey Bogart so beautiful.  He’s certainly not conventionally handsome, yet I could spend hours gazing at his face.  It’s no wonder he became the love of 19-year-old Lauren Bacall’s life.  I love CASABLANCA of course but KEY LARGO is one of my personal favorites. 

Ah Jimmy Cagney!  Another unconventional charmer who could play either angel or devil.  You never knew for sure whether he was going to smash a grapefruit in your face or break into a rousing chorus of Yankee Doodle Dandy, but his energy and his appeal were undeniable. 

If you like your men strong with a rolling gait and an unmistakable drawl, then John Wayne is the man for you.  I grew up watching him in all of his different incarnations and no matter how old or paunchy he got, he never really lost his craggy charm.  He was both a man’s man and a lady’s man and he made you feel as if you would always be safe in his arms. (And if you ever get a chance, watch a very young John Wayne in ANGEL AND THE BADMAN because it’s one of the most classic romances ever filmed.)

Beautiful and dangerous, James Dean was truly too fast to live and too young to die.  Although he was only 24 at the time of his death in 1955, this fair-haired boy from Indiana blazed his signature on our psyches to become an American icon. 

Ah Cary Grant ...there’s something timelessly irresistible about a man this gorgeous who can still laugh at himself. 

Errol Flynn can swash my buckle any day! 

Rock Hudson rocked our world (and Doris Day’s) in romantic comedies like PILLOW TALK, LOVER COME BACK and SEND ME NO FLOWERS.

The consummate gentleman in a world in desperate need of them, Gregory Peck used his smoldering good looks to make the world a better place.

Although he was undeniably hot, nobody has ever epitomized “cool” to both men and women like Steve McQueen. 

So who would you pick as your own personal SEXIEST MAN DEAD? Pop on over to my Facebook page HERE and let me know!

I know Russell Crowe is supposed to be a voracious reader but I’m not sure if the pic to the left is intended to promote reading or be a cautionary warning against smoking in bed.

I will say that it did get me thinking about where I like to read. Unlike some of you, I’m not coordinated enough to read in the bathtub. If I tried, I’m afraid the only result would be a very wrinkled me and a swollen, sodden mass of wood pulp that used to be a book.

In the summer I love to curl up on this divine divan in our sun room. I’ve coveted a divan ever since I was a little girl and I saw an illustration in LITTLE WOMEN of Jo March reclining on her attic divan on a rainy day, eating a juicy red apple and reading a novel. (Unfortunately I’m more likely to be stuffing my piehole with a bag of dark chocolate M&M’s.) It’s so relaxing to be reading with a gentle breeze drifting through the windows or the rain pattering down on the metal roof. Of course the real challenge is resisting the temptation to lay the book aside and snuggle down for an afternoon nap!

In the winter I nest in this oversized chair in the corner of our living room away from the TV. It was the wall-to-wall bookshelves that sold me on this house. There’s something terribly comforting about glancing up and seeing all of those other books glowing softly in the light--some already well-read and much-loved, others just waiting to be discovered. And the best thing about this chair-and-a-half is that there’s exactly enough room for me and at least half a cat! (Or one cat and half of me.)

When I was a child, my dad used to cook a big breakfast for us every Saturday morning. And my official job while he cooked was...to stay in bed and read! I still remember how cozy it felt to be tucked into bed reading HALF-MAGIC or THE PRINCESS BRIDE while the sound of my daddy’s whistling and the succulent aroma of bacon wafted up the stairs.

There are some books you always remember because of WHERE you read them. (Hospital waiting room, anyone?) I first read THE HOBBIT on a sunny Saturday afternoon while sitting cross-legged at the very top of a fire tower at Pennyrile State Park with the forest stretched out below me as far as the eye could see. (I could almost see the Eagles come swooping over the horizon to save the battle and the day!) I read ROOTS when I was 13 during a long car trip to Disney World. And I finished Stephen King and Peter Straub’s THE TALISMAN on the way home from a vacation in Massachusetts with Phil Collins singing, “Take Me Home” as the perfect accompaniment to the final moments of both the trip and the book.

So where do YOU like to read? Is there a special chair or couch that makes it easier for your imagination to make the leap into another world? Pop on over to my Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/TeresaMedeirosFanPage to share your favorite spot!

I have something very special for you. A new video, not your usual book video at all … I want you to go watch it right now, then come back. I’ll wait right here. http://www.christinadodd.com/video_cia.html (whistling, tapping my fingers …)

You’re back! Isn’t that great? The video was so much fun to write and make! I’ve been anxiously waiting for the reprint of CASTLES IN THE AIR to hit the shelves so I could share the video with you — and you could share it with your friends.

The really good news is that CASTLES IN THE AIR has been re-released with a new, beautiful, normal cover, and it’s a darned entertaining story. Read the excerpt:

ENGLAND 1166

Then again, perhaps she couldn’t say anything. Bundled as she was, with her head bobbing beside the horse’s belly, he couldn’t see her face, and he began to wonder if she could breathe properly. Leaning down, he groped for her face, and those same strong teeth he admired bit deep into his fingertips. He jerked his hand back with a grunt and an oath.

Hadn’t he compared her to a wild creature? His own carelessness was responsible for his pain.

Her breath froze as she panted harshly, the sound rending the still air. Scratched from the sky by bare, ice-tipped branches, the snow sifted down relentlessly, filling the spaces between the dried leaves with a thin layer of white. It was cold, and getting colder by the moment. “We’ll be there soon,” he said aloud, and held her firmly as his promise brought renewed strife.

He topped the hill. Here the threatening blizzard threatened no more. It was reality, and the world disintegrated into a narrow, white passage that opened as they moved through and closed behind them. The woodcutter’s hut stood not far ahead, yet he worried about the lady. He leaned over to give her his body warmth and peered ahead.

Dug into the hill, the hut proved a godsend for him, providing a stock of fuel for warmth and a store of dried foods. Traveler’s provender, he’d guessed, provided by Lady Juliana of Lofts … and used by him for her abduction.

Order CASTLES IN THE AIR from Borders:
http://www.borders.com/online/store/TitleDetail?sku=0061080349

Order CASTLES IN THE AIR from Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Castles-Air-Christina-Dodd/dp/0061080349/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256856883&sr=1-2

And remember — forward this letter and the link for the CASTLES IN THE AIR video http://www.christinadodd.com/video_cia.html to your friends who like a good laugh and a good book!

Warmly,

Christina Dodd
http://www.christinadodd.com
For the wild at heart!

One thing they never tell you about child raising is that for the rest of your life, at the drop of a hat, you are expected to know your child’s name and how old he or she is. — Erma Bombeck

Being a witch comes naturally to some—no, not the Witch Political, the old fashioned caricature. You know.  Wicked Witch of the West. The cackling hag. The hook-nosed, green skinned, wart covered old bat that pokes out newts’ eyes for her diabolical soups...Oops. Sorry. I got carried away. Anyway, my point is that I possess a natural bent towards such witchiness and all things Halloween that my husband doesn’t. So, of course, when our kid (Doodah) started making the trick or treat rounds Daddy got nominated to trudge dutifully behind her as I gleefully remained home, ohing and awing at the various ghouls and monsters and politicians (and yes, that grouping was purposeful) that showed up with hands out stretched and bags at ready. 

But soon, oh-ing and ah-ing palled and I began to yearn to partake more fully in the festivities and the first thought that came to min was that I could be a witch. Mind you, this was long before the explosion of Halloween as a commercial industry. People carved pumpkins and doled out candy and sometimes stuck an animated 14” tall, moon-walking Frankenstein in their front windows but that was pretty much it. The first year I dressed up I put down as my rehearsal and while fun, it wasn’t as much fun as I had envisioned it being. Somehow, opening my suburban door dressed in black dress and wearing a wig failed to strike awe into the tender little breasts of my neighbor kids. Which , of course, was my goal. Children today are too sophisticated. Even the three year old from down the block could see through my disguise – or maybe she just didn’t think there was enough difference between what I opened the door in and my usual muck-about-the-yard garb.

The next year I decided to go for broke. Oh, mind, I wasn’t about to dump tons of money we didn’t have into the project but with a little ingenuity and some really dim lights, I made out. I donned my navy blue bathrobe, floor length with a zip front, bought a pointy hat at JoAnne Fabrics, and liberated Doodah’s karaoke machine (complete with vibrato special effects) from the attic where it had been banished until Doodah could carry a tune (still waiting for that.) Then, just after the dinner hour, I climbed out onto the faux balcony above the garage with a bag of mini-snickers bars, turned the karaoke machines’ volume and vibrato up full blast, and peeled forth with the witchly cackle to end all cackles. I have it on good authority that as many as three blocks away strong men paled upon hearing my witchly bell canto. And when flocks of little goblins came tripping up to my front door I would peer over the eaves and cackle, “Hey kiddies! Want a treat or would you rather I had one....?” Oh. I’m giving myself shills. Not as many as I gave the neighborhood kids who clutched each other and screamed in a rhapsody of delighted terror as I lured them forth in my karaoke enhanced voice, “Here, kiddie, kiddie. Here kiddie, kiddie.” As soon as they reached the porch, I’d lean over and toss down their candy to them. And a good time was had by all.

So began my blighted career as the Balfanz Witch.

I am humbled to admit that I was an instant hit with the sub-ten crowd.  As the years went by my notoriety grew. People would walk for blocks to come to the house just so I could rain snicker bars down on their kids –and just what does that say about parents of today, anyway? Then one cold, blustery Halloween night it all came to an end. Hubris and my own ignorance of the average thirteen year old’s capacity for revenge were my undoing.

I was sitting on my roof about to call it a night. It was late, the four to seven year old crowd were long gone and the eight to eleven year old surge was pretty much over, too. All that was left were the twelve to fourteen year old stragglers. You know them. The older brothers and sisters of the darling tykes dressed up as Tinkerbelle and Pound Puppy? The age bracket that is too cool to dress up but are still young enough that the idea of a bag of free candy is irresistible? The stage of life where they are just perfecting the sneers that will pretty much carry them through the next half decade? Yeah, those kids. Anyway I was just about to call it a night when four females showed up. They were about thirteen or so and all four had turned their jackets around and wore hand printed envelopes that read “Backward Girl.” And to think all the years I’d been ashamed of Doodah’s cheapo ghost bedsheet…

They couldn’t see me; The lights were on over the front porch which made me, hovering on the rooftop overhead, invisible. They shuffled around at the bottom of the drive a few minutes and I could hear them talking. I have to admit that the only bit of charm this quartet showed that night was their speech. It was a weird synthesis of 80’s Valley Girl vocabulary with a Fargo-esque accent.

“This is that house where that lady dresses up as a witch,” said Backward Girl #1.

“Oh, fer lame,” said Backward Girl #2.

“Duh,” Backward Girl #3 agreed –at least I think that was meant as an agreement. “What-ever.”

“It’s like way stoo-pid,” said Backward Girl #4. “Who’d be scared of some old witch dressed up like some old witch?”

There ensued hoots of laughter at this penultimate example of pubescent wit.

“Totally,” Backward Girl #1 said when the hilarity died down. “It’s like so sketchy. ‘Look at me! I’m a scary witch!’ It’s like totally lame.”

“You betcha, er, I mean, totally,” Backward Girl # 4 agrees.

“So, then, let’s go and get our candy,” Backward Girl # --oh, hell who cares which girl said what? They were like totally interchangeable anyway.

Now, I am not proud of what happened next but I was a trifle offended by these aspersions on my ability to strike terror into kids’ hearts so, in a truly uninspired moment, I decided to have a little “fun” with the girls. As they started up the driveway, I crept out off the balcony and onto the roof, lurking just out of the sight at the edge of the eaves.

They milled about on the porch a few seconds before one of them pushed the doorbell as another said, “I am so scared I can hardly stand it.” At which point, I popped out over the eaves, just above their heads and shout, “Heya girls!” in my best-cracked, wicked witch voice.

Their reaction was all a defamed witch could want. They jumped at least a foot in the air, shrieked like banshees, and clutched each other like, well, like little girls. 

“Want some candy?” I cackled.

They did not want some candy. Their terror was, of course, over in a matter of seconds, and I reckoned they’d just stomp off in a teenage huff. I reckoned wrong. I know. Stupid. In my own defense, all I can say was that Doodah was little yet and I didn’t yet know that the absolute worst thing in the world you can do to a thirteen year old girl is embarrass her in front of her peers and that if you do, you do so at your own peril.

“Get her, girls!” Backwards Girl Whatever shouted as with a cry of young female rage (the most fieresome kind), the girls fell to the ground and started scooping up windfall crabapples.
I squatted on the roof, mouth gaping, as the little bi—er, witches started hurling crabapples at me. Lots of crabapples! And I’m going on record today to say I think at least a couple of those girls must have ended up on the Olympic fast pitch softball team because those suckers HURT!

Now, I was not in a good position being stuck on a steeply sloping roof as I was, so I started a quick retreat, crabapples whacking my hat askew and making way too many directs hits on the undoubtedly too easy target of my giant bathrobe encased bum. By the time I scrambled back onto the balcony, I was ready for some payback –I did mention this maybe wasn’t my finest moment-- but I didn’t have any crabapples. What I did have was mini-snickers bars. Lots of ‘em,

The ensuing battle raged for a good ten minutes, volleys of dozens of crabapples countered by my own sniper-like accuracy with one candy bar at a time. We fought grimly, mutely, and in earnest, the silence punctuated by little “Uffs!” and an occasional “Ow!” and quite a few expletives (and these weren’t from me.)

Alas, despite my valiant last stand, ultimately there could only be one outcome: there were, after all, five crabapple trees down on the front lawn and only two bags of candy on the balcony with me, and I know when to quit. So, pitching my last snicker bar, I raised my fist and shook it at the sneering girls below, then made as regal an exit as through a small window as one can while wearing a witch hat and a bathrobe. The girls hooted in mockery.

And thus ended my career as the Balfanz Witch. The blue bathrobe returned to being just a bathrobe, the wig has long since been bequeathed to a new generation of witches, and the karaoke machine sits in the attic gathering dust. And Me? I learned a valuable lesson, one that I’m afraid I needed to learn over andover again when Doodah reached puberty: Never, ever underestimate the retaliatory response of an embarrassed teenage girl.

I’d like to say I was disheartened by my experience, that the fun of dressing up just wasn’t there after that night, but the truth was I didn’t dare go out the next year. Or the next. I was afraid they’d come back and next time they’d be packing regular-sized apples.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Aside from Julian in my very own THE VAMPIRE WHO LOVED ME, Spike from BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER is my all-time favorite vampire. (I started to say “fictional vampire”, then realized that would be redundant.) With or without a soul, Spike with his soulful eyes, biting wit, and self-deprecating humor could definitely tempt me to try love at first bite. (And my oh my, what about those cheekbones???!!!)

Spike (as portrayed by the incomparable James Marsters) arrived in Sunnydale early in the second season with his lunatic lover Druscilla in tow. Introduced as the definitive Big Bad, no one could have guessed his character’s journey would lead him to fall deeply and irrevocably in love with Buffy, proving just how quickly loathing can turn to love when one’s nemesis is a diminutive blonde with a martyr complex and a weakness for creatures of the night.

Their sizzling chemistry was explored in Season Four in the episode “Something Blue” when a heartbroken Willow inadvertantly cast a love spell on the vampire and the Slayer. To the horror of Buffy’s friends and family, Buffy and Spike begin to nuzzle each other’s necks and pick out china patterns for their wedding. In Spike’s piece de resistance, the Season Five episode “Fool for Love”, the pre-vampire Spike is revealed to have been a sensitive soul, something of a mama’s boy who was christened “Spike” and “William the Bloody” not because he was so fearsome but because he wrote poetry so bloody awful it made you want to drive a spike through your forehead. (What writer who has ever been reviewed by KIRKUS couldn’t identify with that?) This episode also revealed that by the 1980’s Spike had metamorphosed into a leather-clad vampire so preternaturally cool that Billy Idol stole his platinum locks and rebel’s snarl.

Spike won my heart for keeps at the end of this episode when he marched up to Buffy’s house with shotgun in hand, determined to purge his life and heart of the Slayer forever. Instead he ended up letting her cry on his shoulder while he awkwardly patted hers. More tingles ensued when Buffy and Spike finally consummated their attraction with a swoon-worthy kiss at the end of the legendary musical episode, “Once More with Feeling.”

What I’d like to know is: Who is YOUR favorite vampire of all-time? Do you prefer Angel’s Heathcliff-style brooding to Spike’s caustic sarcasm? Did Frank Langella’s smoldering DRACULA tempt you to leave your balcony door unlocked or would you prefer to have Gary Oldman’s untrimmed fingernails caressing your throat? Does Louis or Lestat light your fire? Do you prefer the laid-back Southern gentleman Bill from Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series or the cunning and elegant Jean-Claude from Laurell K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake books?  In a fictional world where every vampire has a little bit of soul, who would YOU be most likely to greet at your front door with those two immortal words, “Bite me”???

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