The Horror of Romance (or the Romance of Horror)

I want to write a romance.

There. I said it.

Not one of those formula romances, of course. That’s not my style. Besides, I tried it once, and I couldn’t keep the characters in line. You’d think two-dimensional people would be easy to manage, but my people were, ironically, too-dimensional. She was too independent and he was too conflicted, so I decided to write a vampire story instead.

That story turned out to be a romance. Well, romantic. She was independent and he was conflicted, but somehow the love affair worked. Too bad it ended tragically. When one party is immortal and the other one isn’t, it’s kinda doomed from the start. Mine worked without a happy ending because, quite frankly, paranormal romance is a genre unto itself and I can’t stick to that formula, either. I have utmost respect for authors who can follow those rules. Trust me, it’s harder than it looks.

You know who wrote great “outside the box” paranormal romance? Anne Rice. She set a new standard for Gothic horror with a romantic slant—or was it Gothic romance with a horrific slant? In any case, her work with vampires and witches was phenomenally fabulous, crazy romantic, deeply, sensuously, gorgeously written, and it gave me permission to blow off the doors when developing my own style. She was my example, my mentor, my yardstick, and my escape. I learned from her while reading everything she wrote.

So why was she not included in the top 100 of PBS’s Great American Read? Anyone? Anyone?

Naturally, I couldn’t resist tuning in to find out how many authors I recognized and which books I’d read (more than I thought and not as many as I’d hoped). After the show, I came away with a lengthy reading list ... and some big-time bitterness on discovering the literary Queen of the Damned’s legendary Vampire Chronicles did not make the top 100 while Stephenie Meyer’s horrific-for-all-the-wrong-reasons Twilight series did.

Weeks later, I’m still not over it. In truth, I may never be over it. Twilight led to the Fifty Shades of Grey debacle (which also made the list, gods help us) so I guess it gets points for inspiring a new voice, but I believe it’s also responsible for destroying an eternal genre and lowering the bar for writing in general.

I know I sound hysterical. I could be overreacting, I suppose, since vampires are rarely out of fashion for long, but comparing Interview with the Vampire to Twilight is like comparing cream to dishwater. I also understand that lists are completely ego-based and of no value in the grand scheme, yet it truly pains me that the writer whose work first obsessed me then compelled me to become the writer I am (undiscovered and pretty darned good) was sacrificed in favour of a writer far less deserving of the placement.

So, in dark and stormy tribute to the incomparable Anne Rice, I am setting out to write that romance.

Grrrrr.

GRRM

I’m a third of the way through A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. This means I’ve read the first of the three stories about Ser Duncan the Tall and his squire, Egg, and am about to embark on the second tale of their adventures—but first, I had to run for The World of Ice and Fire to read up on the politics of the time. The Targaryen kings still ruled Westeros and since a bunch of royals showed up at the tourney in The Hedge Knight, I was compelled to study up and get the names straight.

It’s hard to keep track of so many similarly sounding names (Aemon, Aegon, Aerion, Daemon, Daeron, etc.), hence my determination to get the characters straight. GRRM has said that he’d been told writers should not use names that begin with the same letter more than once in a story, which he felt restricted any cast of characters to a maximum of twenty-six. He added something along the lines of his readers being smart enough to tell their Targaryens apart. Not to mention English royal history, where Williams, Edwards, Richards and Henrys appear in nearly every generation. So he cheerfully uses names more than once, and mixes it up with derivatives of those names until you practically need a map to tell who’s who.

I’m having a ball.

Not only are the Dunk and Egg stories built on solid ground, they flow from one scene to the next, they carry the reader with ease, the imagery is bright and the voices clearly heard, and best of all, they stay with you when you’re not reading. That’s why I consulted the Westerosi Bible to get a better grip on the historic players—book in hand or book elsewhere, in some part of my psyche, I am there.

What a joy to be reminded of why I am a fan. Twenty years ago, the cover art on a paperback copy of A Game of Thrones caught my eye. I fell into the first pages while standing in the bookshop. I devoured the book itself, reading faster and faster, revelling in the writing as much as in the plot. Glorious, glorious, every page was thick and juicy and alive with colour and sound and texture. Sure, I thought it would look fab on film … but just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Season Five has taught me so. Unfortunately, I let my dismay with the TV series weaken my perception of the creator.

Dunk and Egg have reminded me of something vitally important.

GRRM is a masterful writer.

A Song of Ice and Fire was as inspiring to me as The Vampire Chronicles. Even as I read the first volume all those years ago, I was thinking, Could I write something like this? Did I dare to try?

You bet I did.

It started with a book. The written word. One writer speaking to one reader, one page at a time. And that is how I mean for it to stay.

“The Philosophical Vampire” – Preface

I happened on tomorrow’s post during a lunch break this week. Intending to raise my creativity from the grave in the midst of a hectic workday, I carried my exercise book to the library and flipped to what I thought was a blank page. Instead, I found the bulk of a conversation with Julian Scott-Tyler, a sort of preternatural episode of Philosophy Quest in which he smashes the myth of the brooding vampire to smithereenies. This is amusing because when I first met him, he was the quintessential brooding blood hunter, the conflicted hero prone to bouts of romantic drama, at war with what he was and the one who had made him. Great fun at the time. Nicole was writing a poetic cycle called Eros American and almost every poem within it reminded me of Jules—dark, glittering, savagely beautiful, crazy sexy, and absolutely ruthless in possession of his prey.

He still has those qualities. Perhaps his most admirable trait, however, is his flexibility. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating that he fits as easily into the modern world as he did in the Victorian age or seventeenth century Europe. This flexibility has saved his sanity in ways that elude many of his kind—and many of mine, too. I have also noticed that he looks over my shoulder when I’m reading Anne Rice, as if he’s comparing himself to Lestat and chuckling softly under his breath—at who, which or what, I am unsure and he is not saying.

Or he wasn’t.

This conversation resulted from the recent resurgence of the Rice vampires, most notably during Lestat’s ardent lamentation of what terrible fate must await his lost and aching soul. I’d be reading merrily along and suddenly Jules would cough or snort or sigh in my ear. Fed up, I finally dared him to tell me what the heck he was thinking because a major difference between Lestat and my Julian is that Julian thinks. He acts when he must, but he’s no James Bond. He reads and he ponders—and he’s come up with a fair argument for getting out of this estate with his soul intact.

Enjoy.

Bibliography VI

“Blood Canticle”—Anne Rice

I love Lestat. I love Anne Rice. I’m not too crazy about the Mayfair witches, especially Rowan and Mona, so having them show up in this volume of The Vampire Chronicles was going to be a challenge, but I was willing to give it a whirl.

Parts of it were dazzling. She will never lose her ability to mesmerize with written imagery. I think I even got the point of the story—Lestat longs to be a saint; he wants to do good though he believes he is eternally damned, so he sets out to solve a mystery for a pair of mortal witches—but the end result was more crazy quilt than polished brocade.

It helps to like the characters, and I don’t like the two Mayfairs who showed up here. I don’t get why Lestat insists on making a vampire of everyone he loves when a) he always ends up alone and b) their mortality is what attracts him in the first place. He does it over and over, and it always backfires on him. He’s young in vampire years, but really? I’m way younger than he is and I’ve figured it out. But why he felt so passionately for one mortal in this story absolutely escapes me, as I saw nothing remotely lovable about her and he didn’t explain it. He was simply, suddenly, obsessed and in love. That relationship didn’t fit within the story, either; it was more of a distraction, an annoying buzz that popped up during a lull in the action, and culminating in a final chapter that meant pretty well nothing so far as I could tell.

Then there’s the haunting—he’s plagued by the Mayfair patriarch’s ghost, who resents Lestat stealing the favoured daughter from the light, but again, that relationship didn’t work for me. It made too little sense. I couldn’t figure out how he appeased the spirit enough to make him go away, so it either wasn’t explained very well or I didn’t care enough to carry it with me when I wasn’t actually reading.

I like a story that stays with me between bouts.

It’s painful to admit. I didn’t get it, so I didn’t feel it, and that made me an indifferent reader. Whether a book is good or bad is completely subjective, that’s why I place little value on critical reviews. I will rave about a book that inspires me, however, and adhere—or try—to the adage about saying nothing if you can’t say something positive. I’ll wear the fact that I missed the author’s vision in this instance, but the greater angst lies in my having once understood and adored her work. Honestly, her earlier novels are magical. Her later ones harbour diamonds in the prose, but the stories are less coherent, more chaotic and peopled with characters in relationships that I find hard to swallow. Blood Canticle, unfortunately, almost choked me.

Road Markers

So isn’t it a little eerie that my first F***book “like” as Ruth R. Greig/Writer is Anne Rice/Public Figure, and on the morning of my “liking” her page, the first post I see on my newsfeed is a Happy Birthday to Michael York?

If I believe in coincidence, it’s by another name. Life is full of indicators, little signs that you’re on the right track. That’s how I feel about this FB project “coinciding” with my recent intention to make a career of my writing, which “coincided” with my return to reading the Vampire Chronicles, which put me back in touch with Anne Rice, which has “coincidentally” reminded me of how it all began with Yorkie.

Full circle? Hardly—though it seems that the components sprinkled throughout my development have reappeared at this juncture. It’s good to remember where you started. It’s good to recall the people and the moments that shaped your future. It’s good to look back and see how you got here.

Seeing Yorkie’s face on Ms. Rice’s FB page felt like a little miracle, a nod from the Universe that all is well and there’s nothing to stop my plan from succeeding. Keep it up, Ru. Keep the intention going. Plan like success is inevitable. Get yourself together and watch it unfold. Cherish the reminders, face the challenges (there will be some) and most of all stay out of your own way!

Throughout my life, I’ve had friends and family behind me, encouraging me, supporting me, telling me to get off my duff and make something of my passion. Truth is, I wasn’t ready to make it so. I lacked confidence and direction, and quite frankly, motivation. I didn’t believe that I could make a living by doing something that I love. Lots of people have done it, but not me. Nope, I’d have to stick with the day job if I wanted to pay the bills, and so I did. It’s taken me this long to build enough self-esteem to stand up and declare that I am a writer, that I’m a darned good writer, and that I deserve to be successful at it. I’ve been practicing from the age of fourteen, after all, when I fell in love with Yorkie and first read Interview with the Vampire.

How appropriate that these two vital points in my past appear now, together, as I prepare to step off the edge of the world. Coincidence? What do you think?

Thunder-struck

I’ve not been writing much of late. It’s typical at this time of year, when fiscal-year-end eclipses life outside the office. I’ve been reading instead, seeking inspiration to keep from freaking out that I’ve lost my gift. Honestly, it happens every spring, and every spring I must remind myself that this ain’t my first rodeo. After Easter, I’ll have time that I presently don’t have to create. In the meantime, read, read, read. I’m almost finished with Lestat and have borrowed Station Eleven from a friend after reading kudos for it from GRRM and Erin Morgenstern.

I’ve also scored a copy of She’s Got Soul—a compilation CD from the Starbucks collection that features Nina Simone, Amy Winehouse, Etta James, and a host of other soul sistahs. It’s squaring off against Diana Krall’s Wallflower for air time on my stereo. I’ve played around with opening scenes and story ideas on Tuesday nights, but have been totally disinclined to boot the writing rig on my days off. I did discover that I can stream whole episodes of X Company from cbc.ca, however, and I’ve baked a lot of muffins in that downtime. Ter and I were also supposed to travel to Vancouver for the Flyers/Canucks game on the 17^th, but the energy required to get there, plus the inconvenience of losing two workdays at this critical juncture, convinced us to stay home and watch the game on TV.

It’s the worst time to wrestle with my muse. I am easily frustrated by alluring fragments for new works and reminders of those that have stalled. I realize that I haven’t finished anything since January, when the speed picked up at work, and have recently (irrationally) wondered if I will ever finish anything that isn’t about vampires. This prompted me to consider, for the nth time, unraveling the novel to the first eight chapters and writing it in another direction though the only thing wrong with what I’ve written so far is me.

Ter and I saw Celtic Thunder perform on March 11. The lads came to Victoria on their “Best Of” tour, and with Damian McGinty returned to the fold, I was taken back in time to the early days of my Fixed Fire series. The first few volumes were driven by Def Leppard and Sarah McLachlan, but a good chunk of the next generation was fuelled by the Celtic boys and “Celtic Woman” before them. Hearing the songs that sparked so vibrantly in my imagining a handful of years ago was a welcome jolt to the system last week. At this point, I’m either winding down at work or completely desperate to escape it, because seeing the show brought back all the passion I felt for my Castasian characters and their wild green mountainous magical world. This past weekend, I dragged out the novel again, reconnected with the story, and have committed to finishing the f***er or die trying.

This is volume 7. I’ve got material for one more after this, and part of my motivation to finish Reijo’s story is so I can get to Aurelia’s. Make no mistake; I adore Reijo. He’s my white knight in dented armour and he deserves a happy ending. I’m just not very good at happy endings, so doing right by him has been a struggle. I need him now, though, to prove to myself that vampires are not my sole strength, to get me through year-end and give me a project for a much-needed writing holiday planned for some time in April.

The “Big Pink” Baby

The couple downstairs brought their new baby girl home a few weeks ago. With Ter and me living directly above her, we’ve expected to be “up with the baby” of a night since she got out of the hospital. Despite her parents’ apologies for the screaming, however, we have yet to hear anything more than occasional cooing and, even more infrequently, a little fussing. I reckon once she gets some power behind her lungs, we’ll hear her more often and that’s okay. It’s what babies do, and when she gets rolling, I hope I’ll feel more for the new parents than myself. Children were not in my cards on this go-round, so I’ve been spared the anxiety attached to being responsible for a newborn, an anxiety which our sleep-deprived neighbours have admitted to feeling as they set out on this journey—without a map, may I add.

I do wonder why babies cry, though. I mean, really. What do they have to cry about? I get the wet diaper discomfort and I imagine the warm squishy didie isn’t much fun, either. I understand being First World hungry and the startling sharpness of intestinal gas pains; I also get the too-hot, too-cold dilemma, especially when you don’t control the thermostat and lack the motor skills to manage your own sweater, but other than those trifling irritants, there’s no reason for spontaneous squalling—right?

Well …

Something occurred to me while revisiting The Tale of the Body Thief—the story where Lestat de Lioncourt, after two hundred years, decides he’s done with being a vampire and wants to be mortal again. Enter a man with the ability to force a soul from its flesh and take that body as his own. He convinces Lestat to switch bodies with him and Lestat recklessly agrees to try it for a day. Naturally, the Body Thief absconds with Lestat’s immortal body and the chase begins as the ousted vampire sets out to regain his perfected form. There’s other stuff woven through the tale—love and redemption and salvation and reconciliation etc.—but Lestat’s memories prove to be grossly over-romanticized when he opens his mortal eyes and cannot figure out why the light is so dim. The weight of his mortal flesh is overwhelming, the body is clumsy and sluggish, the senses are muzzy and indistinct, and then, oh joy, he catches a wicked savage cold and ends up in the hospital. In due course, he grows accustomed to his cumbersome state, but as I read his story, it dawned on me that his plight was not unlike what our souls must face when we are born into the human experience.

Imagine coming from a place of weightlessness, where the light is luminous and never truly dark, where we can transport ourselves on the strength of a whim, and landing in a dimension where gravity keeps us grounded, where sight and sound are murky and lack resonance, where we must learn to express ourselves with speech rather than a telepathic flash of imagery. Imagine being part of a great collective consciousness, of sharing thoughts and dreams and visions with ease, of belonging to something bigger and more powerful than oneself, then being disconnected, singled out and alone.

I cannot say for certain that our combined essence actually exists on such a plane, but I’m pretty darned sure it’s vastly different from what we know as carbon-based life forms assigned to this intensely physical phase. Being mortal is damned difficult work; it’s lonely, exhausting, and painful, and I’m fortunate that I don’t remember where I came from, otherwise I might have quit a long time ago. Never mind that I chose this estate, that I clamoured to come here and learn something from the struggle. I asked for this. I wanted to be mortal, to experience Contrast in the best way possible, which was to squeeze myself into this bag of meat and bone and go forth with good intention … and no idea how hard it would be. Yes, there is joy in this state. There is love and pleasure and music and the flavour of chocolate, but these things are gained as you go.

It surely must be worse for babies and small children, so fresh from the shell and yet tied to the go-before. Who wouldn’t be dismayed about unforeseen constriction of the flesh, not to mention the isolation that comes with it? We are all human, yet the physical condition cuts us off from our fellows unless we make the effort to reconnect, not as we connect in our soul state, but through social contact and mutual cooperation. Babies don’t speak our language and we’ve lost our ability to communicate without words. How frustrating and how scary it is to find oneself in a world so foreign when all the brochures promised a great adventure.

Maybe that’s why babies cry. When the “Big Pink” baby ramps up the volume and I happen to be nearby, I might just ask her—or maybe I’ll just cuddle her, and assure her that though she may feel otherwise, she is not alone.

Bibliography V

“Prince Lestat”— Anne Rice

Loved it! But, of course, I love Lestat. The self-proclaimed James Bond of vampires, he is likely more celebrated than Dracula … though he hasn’t had the same amount of screen time. Something to do with copyright law, no doubt. And just as well. What screen versions I’ve seen have fallen far short of my imagination. Some things are better left on the page. One might also suspect the author, in this case, of falling back on her most famous hero to resurrect a flagging career, but I tend to think that the character simply had something more to say. The scribe merely answered the call.

That is, after all, what we writers do.

For the longest time, I revered the way Anne Rice did it, too. Her style was my blueprint. I aspired to write those deeply lush and sensual descriptions myself. I perceived her work as the most meticulously cut-and-polished jewels: richly-hued, multi-faceted, artfully displayed, and absolutely bedazzling to the mind’s eye. I swore to write as well as Anne Rice or die trying.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I began this read in luscious anticipation and discovered myself editing the copy as I went along! Make no mistake: the story is riveting, the possibilities purely believable, the characters drawn in lovingly minute detail, the scenery meticulously described … but the writing itself runs rough, seeming more like an initial draft than a satiny smooth final version. I found myself making mental corrections when I should have been slipping into a world I remember as flawlessly buffed and burnished. I emerged thinking—arrogantly, perhaps?—that I could have done a better job with this absolutely wonderful story!

Which begs the question: which is more important, the story or the telling? Does a good writer make a half-baked story work? Or does a good story make a half-baked writer look competent? I guess either option is true, depending as much on the reader as any plot portent or turn with a phrase. I consider myself—arrogantly, perhaps?—to be a fairly high level reader, which is why I’m resisting the reading assignment from hell (blog post TBD), and because I love wordplay as much as I do a vivid character or an intriguing storyline, I demand a lot from my authors. Chuck Wendig advises all writers to read good books and bad books, one to inspire humility and the other to inspire confidence. Prince Lestat is a damned good story. The writing may even meet today’s appalling standard. It’s just not up to my memory of Anne Rice’s standard, and that makes it a little disappointing.

To assure myself that I have not misremembered her earlier skill, I am revisiting The Tale of the Body Thief, which also happens to be my favourite of the Lestat stories. And, no, I have not misremembered. I am sitting with him at the café, I am laughing out loud at his ongoing angst with Louis, I am seeing the sights and smelling the scents and shivering in the snow with no internal editor to distract me from the magic of the tale. So what gives? Did the author get lazy? Did she become too famous to require an editor? Is the editor intimidated by her fame? A fan will pick up the book no matter what the critics say, which is as it should be, and a fan will make up his/her own mind as to whether or not the money/time was wasted. For myself, it absolutely was not. I learned a lot from this book, even more than the future of the Rice vampires or the fate of their prince. I learned a little more about myself, about my craft, and about how important it is for a writer to keep reading.

Now, about that assignment from hell …

Year of the Vampire

Back in 1976, my older sister brought home a paperback novel called Interview with the Vampire. A fifteen-year-old Ru read it and it changed her world. Anne Rice’s vampires did what Bram Stoker’s could not—they made the night sexy and romantic and tragic and gorgeous. The story was Louis’, but Lestat stole the show.

Walking through the mall in 1985, I spied a display of hardcovers in the bookshop, each titled The Vampire Lestat. Apparently, the villain in Interview had captured more souls than mine, and while it took Anne Rice a decade to publish the sequel, it was worth the wait. Her writing inspired me to pattern my own style after hers; oft accused of indulging in “purple prose”, she painted scenery and sensation like no one else I’d read. I wanted to paint the pictures in my head with the same robust strokes, employing the same air-brushed hyperbole to burnish the end result. I read each successive volume of The Vampire Chronicles (The Tale of the Body Thief remains my favourite), but hopped off the bandwagon when Ms. Rice veered off to tell stories of ghosts, witches and werewolves. I admit, fascinating as the other creatures of the night may be, vampires top my food chain.

This past year, Ms. Rice returned to the vampire world with Prince Lestat—I am nearly finished devouring my copy (thanks, Ter!), and once again, my imagination has been fired by the beauty in liberating darkness. The ultimate predator, armed with preternatural allure and indomitable will, the vampire does more than inhabit that darkness. He owns it.

Over the past twenty years, I’ve written a slew of my own vampires, each from a wholly different world and possessed of entirely unique and individual personality. Each of my top three exists in his own nocturnal sphere that, like parallel dimensions, operates side by side with, but doesn’t cross over into, the others. I recently had the brilliant idea of bringing them together for a writing exercise, but every one of them wanted to know why he should oblige me.

Except Black, of course. Black flatly refused … which opened the floor to his arch-nemesis, Raymond de Haven, but still, with Julian reluctant and Darius plainly unconvinced, my great idea seems doomed. Unless they have something to say, none of them will cooperate. I guess it’s a sign of pure character development that I can’t make my vamps do my bidding. Apparently I work for them …

… as it should be.

Surrender

 

 

“If you surrender and go with her, you have surrendered to enchantment, as if in a voluptuous dream.”

 

Way back in the 1970s, this was the Boston Globe’s opinion of Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire. I would dearly love to have it apply to my writing, so I’ve kept it in my heart for all these years and aspired to be worthy of it.

 

I was heavily influenced by Anne Rice in the 1980s, then George R.R. Martin, and now, Rob Thurman. Three vastly different authors with three vastly different styles, each of which has left an impression that may or may not be reflected in my own writing. In striving to emulate each of them, I have also discovered and developed my singular style, for which I am eternally grateful to them as teachers, and as storytellers.

 

I write about people. Families, lovers, friends, enemies, passersby and casual acquaintances, they are all connected through their human experience. If you surrender and come with me, you will fall in love. Your heart will soar and your heart will break. You will know joy. You will know pain. You will laugh. You will cry. You will be hunted. You will be the hunter. You will cradle a child to your breast. You will mourn that child. You will know fear and you will know relief. You will see and hear and feel the characters’ experience to the nth degree – but you will also find that nothing has changed when it’s over. You will be safe and sound in your comfy chair ... and if I’ve done my job well, you will remember.

 

But first, you must surrender.

One Acquainted With the Night

This isn't actually Julian. It's John Taylor ...
but he sure looks like Julian!

Evening is his favourite time of day, so it seems appropriate that he suggests meeting to talk over dinner. He calls at 5 p.m. to tell me that he’s running late, but will be by to pick me up as soon as he can get free.

When he finally arrives, 2 hours later, he does so in a white stretch limousine. The driver holds the door for me and I, felling a bit like Cinderella, accept the long slender hand which extends from within the shadowy interior of the car. He draws me in to sit beside him on the soft leather seat, the door closes with a muted thump, and the limo glides away from the curb.

He is decked out in the trappings of a rock star: black leather trousers and a matching bomber jacket over a loose-fitting crimson silk t-shirt, complete with silver-studded belts knotted at his lean hips, and a pair of Ray-Bans over his eyes in spite of the limo’s tinted windows. He compliments me on my appearance and expresses genuine regret at keeping me waiting while he finished up at the television studio. “We’ve missed our reservations, I’m afraid,” he adds, pulling a battered cardboard box from the far corner. I inspect the contents at his invitation: paté, French baguettes, Edam cheese, petit fours and a chilled bottle of champagne. “I hope you don’t mind,” he says in his soft voice, as classical baroque music begins to mingle with the warm spicy scent of Paco Rabanne. He removes his sunglasses and tosses them aside with a smile. “We’ll have more privacy this way.”

I look at him, wondering whether this is going to be an interview, or a seduction.

copyright 1988 Ruth R. Greig

* * *

This is an excerpt from the biography I wrote in 1988 about a fictional rock band called Jazz. Painful as it is to read, it is also my first recorded encounter with one who has become my best-beloved character – the truly eternal Julian Scott-Tyler.

Classically-trained, born to wealthy parents, alternately temperamental and casually offhand, he was passionate, opinionated, brooding, and wildly romantic. He was also the bass player. Listening to Jazz will never see the light of day, but it was the first big project I ever completed. I was also reading Anne Rice at the time, envying her lushly textural style, and one day lamented to Ter, “I wish I could write a vampire story like her.” To which Ter reasonably replied, “Why don’t you?”

Bwahahahaha! It had never occurred to me that I could, let alone would, write a vampire story. But the idea intrigued me and I immediately set about scouting for my immortal hero. I can’t say that Julian put up his hand – like most of his kind, he was conscripted – but, boy, did he rise to the challenge. I worked with him and his world for years, finally producing a series of short stories collectively titled Stolen Seasons in which he, if not narrating himself, figured prominently throughout the larger tale.

He is one of those characters who stay with you long after the story is over. Seasons is set in the 1880s, but the cool thing about Julian is that he has moved with the times. He fits in the modern world as well as he fit in the old one. This flexibility makes me hopeful that he will one day have more to say – and based on a story I wrote last Christmas, there`s a very good chance that he will. But not yet.

Not yet.

Until he decides to talk again, I remember him fondly on his original birthday (vampires have two – the first to mortal parents and the second to immortality), so to celebrate May 27, raise a glass of cabernet or tomato juice – or O-negative, if you`re that way inclined – and join me in a toast to the eternally incomparable Julian Scott-Tyler.

Happy 378^th birthday, handsome.