Anne Rice

October 5, 2008 (St. Petersburg Times / Colette Bancroft) -- The elegant suite at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel is flooded with sunlight. Before a huge window looking out on luxuriant gardens, a small figure sits at a desk, writing intently, her back to the room. Then Anne Rice puts down her pen and rises to greet a guest.

From Dracula to Lestat to Mona the Vampire, the thirst for vampire novels is unquenchable. They've been examined from every conceivable angle, done to death as it were, and yet literature about them proliferates at greater speed than vampires themselves could ever hope to. So what is it about books featuring the undead that holds us so much in thrall?

After vowing to never again write about Lestat, this best seller reveals she has one more vampire novel in her. Her newest religious book is Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana.  Anne Rice recently engaged in an online chat to answer questions from fans.

1. Do you ever plan to write additional books for the Vampire Chronicles series?

February 24, 2008 (Time / Carolyn Sayre) -- "One more book." Those are the words Anne Rice fans have been dying to hear about the Vampire Chronicles ever since her shocking  --  and dismaying to many of his followers  --  turn to religious writing. Long seen as a committed atheist, four years ago the best-selling author drove a stake through the hearts of her followers when she vowed to abandon her sinister stories and instead write only of the Lord.

January 23, 2008 (BBC) -- An American man who took the name of a fictional vampire has been sentenced to 30 years for bombing two hotels in La Paz, according to Bolivian state media. Triston Jay Amero, 26, carried out the attacks with his Uruguayan ex-girlfriend, Alda Ribeiro Costa, 47.