The other day over at my writing blog, I mused about something that’s often puzzled me; that is, the subject of Vampire Reproduction. With vampires, I wondered, why are they so often infertile, when by the rules, they ought to be more than capable of reproduction? I won’t rehash everything I said over there, but do take a look if you’re curious or would like to weigh in on the subject. I find my mind often wonders into these strange little alleys and then gets stuck there sometimes, leaving me no choice but to slowly work my way out. Today’s little alley concerns werewolves. Werewolves aren’t infertile, but with them, I wonder, since they can change forms without damage to their internal organs, how come t werewolf lore so often includes the caveat that they have to mate as humans? Or, alternatively, that they can’t mate as wolves and have the pregnancy last? Let’s set aside one of the really obvious answers (the squick factor). Click here to read the rest of Carolyn’s blog, comment and to enter her contest. Visit FreshFiction.com to learn more about books and authors.

When I was in fourth grade, I convinced myself that a vampire loitered outside my bedroom window waiting for me to go to sleep. Being a precocious child, I decided to outwit this fiend. So when I’d get in bed, I’d lay still and flat as a plank under the covers with a pillow over my head. I’d leave the bedside lamp on too, for that added touch of authenticity. “Nothing to see here. Move along.” My plan must have worked because that vampire never found me. He also never, as I’d hoped he would, bypass my “empty” bed and go down the hall to take care of my sister. Oh well. A few years later, Michael Jackson’s Thriller video gave me nightmares for weeks. In fact, I still can’t watch it now. I didn’t watch the Exorcist until I was in my late twenties, and then stayed up nights imagining that tribal mask peering through my windows at night. Basically, what I’m telling you is I’m a big old sissy. Click here to read the rest of Jaye’s blog and to leave a comment. Visit FreshFiction.com to learn more about books and authors.

Thanks so much for having me as a guest at Fresh Fiction. I’m thrilled to be here! For me, knowing where a character hails from is an essential part of figuring out what makes them tick. This background—the place and time—is especially vital for the vampire characters in my new novel, WICKED GAME (Pocket Books, May 13). My vamps are psychologically and culturally stuck in the era in which they were ‘turned,’ making them walking, stalking time capsules (and perfect for their jobs as disc jockeys at WVMP, The Lifeblood of Rock ‘n’ Roll). WICKED GAME’s hero Shane McAllister, for example, was born in Youngstown, Ohio, in 1968. He was just a boy when the steel mills closed, collapsing the city’s economy. Shane’s own family fell into poverty and despair. Growing up poor made him tough and pessimistic, but it also gave him a core of compassion and understanding. The oldest vampire DJ, blues musician Monroe Jefferson, hails from Natchez, Mississippi. He grew up in a place and time governed by Jim Crow laws, which institutionalized racial segregation. Even now, he’s extremely cautious around the heroine of WICKED GAME, since in Monroe’s day in the Deep South, a black man…

As a reader, don’t you just love finding characters you’d like to have as friends? Or for back up if life got down right dangerous? Or, oo-la-la, as a secret admirer if not a lover? I adore it when I become attached to the characters in books. Those I meet in only one book, I’ll revisit by rereading over and over. Those I meet in a series, I get to revisit with each new book. And, yes, I have been known to reread every book in a series before I read the newest one, if only to touch base and catch up. As a writer, I’ve grown attached to my own characters. So much so, that they are no longer merely “imaginary” friends – they’re full-scale invisible ones!In my debut from Berkley, LA VIDA VAMPIRE, my heroine Cesca is a born and bred native of St. Augustine, FL, the city I now call home. When I go down to the Old Town – with friends or by myself – it’s all too easy to view the sites from Cesca’s point of view. In fact, it’s a struggle not to see through her eyes because she’s that real to me. When…

Years and years ago, when I still played with Barbies, Saturday nights were a magical time. They were all about steak dinners with the family around the candlelit table and my dad smoking his cigar in the backyard afterward. Saturday nights were also when IN SEARCH OF… aired on TV, and I remember watching it, enthralled, and oftentimes, scared to death when Leonard Nimoy told us about things like The Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot. Of course, I was young, and I freaked out at everything. So when a certain episode about vampires aired, it left an indelible impression that’s stayed with me until this day. Long claws, sharp teeth, a woman in bed with a gnarly shadow creeping over her…. I was hooked, and it’s no surprise that I’m writing about vampires now for Ace Books. In keeping with what scared me when I was younger, my own vampires usually have a mean streak and will do anything to survive. In fact, my first vamp book THE HUNTRESS (for the defunct Bombshell line from Silhouette) featured a tribe of female bloodsuckers, feral and hard to slay. I loved those gals, but the real villain in that story was vampirism…

The Undead Next Door, which releases January 29th, tells the story of a French vampire named Jean-Luc Echarpe. Jean-Luc has done many things since his transformation in 1513. He’s been a knight, a musketeer, a lieutenant-colonel in the Great Vampire War of 1710, the owner of a fencing academy in Paris, and the Coven Master of Western Europe. That’s him on the cover. What a hunk! Having lived through many different styles of clothing, Jean-Luc knows fashion. So much so that he began designing evening wear for vampires in 1922. By the 1930’s, he was secretly designing evening wear for the Hollywood elite. In 1975, he expanded his business into the mortal world and became a great success! What a great life! He’s a celebrity, surrounded by beautiful models. What more could a guy ask for? Unfortunately, the media has realized that Jean-Luc hasn’t aged in over thirty years. They’re following him everywhere, hounding him with questions. There’s only one thing Jean-Luc can do—go into hiding. He’ll disappear for twenty-five years, then return to his beloved Paris, posing as his own son. He’s too recognizable in Paris or Milan, New York or Los Angeles. Where can he go where no…

Hullo! Here it is, January 2nd, the Christmas sales are over, the New Year’s Day buffet has been reduced to a neat stack of leftovers, and BOND OF FIRE, the Texas vampires’ trilogy volume 2, has finally hit the bookstores! Yes, Hélène d’Agelet, the French secret agent and firestarter, just made it into the Texas vampires trilogy. Need I mention that she’s usually very well-groomed, as in very, very fond of designer clothing? No? Yes, I thought you might have guessed that, since she’s a French aristocrat. She enjoys a glass of good sherry but is willing to explore Texas’s unique ways of drinking beer. She’s also very bookish and prefers her flirtations take place in libraries, which isn’t where you’d expect to find one of those rare lady vampires. Oh, and she’s passionately in love with Jean-Marie St. Just, Texas’s chief diplomat, spy, and assassin. They fell for each other across a crowded ballroom at Versailles over two centuries ago. They’ve suffered through a lot of trials and tribulations ever since, including major pieces of nastiness like the French Revolution and the Peninsular Wars. In fact, matters became so bad Jean-Marie and Hélène have spent the past two centuries…

Right about now you must all be breathing a heavy sigh of relief that Christmas is over and life for the most part–well other than New Years– will get back to normal. Truly, Christmas is a lovely holiday, giving us the chance to spend time with family and—at least for me—visit with cousins and relatives who I only see two or three times a year (and I have great family so I love that.) But boy! Three days of non-stop visiting and eating and unwrapping gifts is very exhausting, don’t you think? I do. I’m about ready to drop. And don’t even mention the Boxing day sales. Holy cow!! People get crazy grumpy out there on their hunts for bargains. It’s a very serious business that bargain shopping stuff. Do not get between another man or woman and their sale item. You could be placing your life at risk. And watch yourselves in the parking lots too! We saw an accident happen right in front of us. A fellow backed his pick up out of his parking spot and right into a car that had stopped to let another car get out of the way. I thought the drivers would…

I’ve been an avid reader since I was ten years old. Blame it on the elementary school’s reading program (re: read twenty books in a month and win a prize!). I wanted that prize, so I read the twenty books. Along the way, I discovered…I LOVED reading. Since then, I’ve always had my nose stuck in a book, much to my childhood best friend’s annoyance. When I was in tenth grade and my older sister was in twelfth, she brought home an assigned reading book. The fiction book sat in the exact same spot she’d dumped it—on the chair next to the stairs—for days. After a week of passing by this book, I picked it up and read the blurb on the back. A mystery to solve and a love story…hmmm, it didn’t sound too bad. I sat down that night and read the entire book and I loved it! I was so excited about the story that I told my sister all about it, hoping I could get her excited enough to read it herself. While I blabbed on and on, my sister nodded and uh huh’d and smiled. The next day she wrote the book report and turned…