A Girl's Guide to Vampires

Interview with Raven Starr

Emerging author, Raven Starr has been writing since she was 15 years old. In 2007, some of her poems are featured in When Times Moves On (Anchor Books), a new poetry anthology. She is also publishing her first novella, The Vampire's Embrace (TreePress.net) and a short e-book, Fantasy (Red Rose Publishing).

Burial Matters

How can you protect your friends and family from vampirism? What steps can you take to ensure that when their corpse goes in the ground, it stays there? Here are a few ideas, gathered from folk mythology, that have helped in the past.

The Historical Dracula, Vlad III Tepes, 1431-1476

Historical Background: Most are probably aware of the fact that when Bram Stoker penned his immortal classic, _Dracula_, he based his vampire villain on an actual historical figure. Stoker's model was Vlad III Dracula (call Tepes, pronounced tse-pesh); a fifteenth century voivode or prince of Wallachia of the princely House of Basarab.

The real vampire slayers

In 2004, Romanian police were called to investigate the desecration of a grave in a remote village just south of Transylvania. What they discovered there could have come straight from a Hammer Horror film. Here, renowned cannibalism expert Dr. Timothy Taylor revisits the scene of the crime.

7 strange ways Humans act like Vampires

With the third movie installment of the "Twilight" movies, "Twilight Saga: Eclipse," based on Stephenie Meyer's best-selling vampire-romance novels, slated to arrive in theaters on June 30, vampires have once again crept into pop culture's collective consciousness. While true, undead vampires do not exist, some diseases and disorders show themselves in ways that are similar to vampiric characteristics. From sunlight intolerance to an aversion to garlic and mirrors, below are six illnesses that, to some extent, cause people to act like vampires:

The Butlerian Vampire

In _Nightshade_ Jack Butler introduces us to John Shade, the standard for a new type of vampire. The Butlerian vampire is a scientific vampire, a mutation of the human norm, rather than the embodiment of pure Evil that Stoker showed us in _Dracula_. Born of human parents, the Butlerian vampire is indistinguishable from a human throughout its life, and perhaps beyond.

Interview: Yuna Kagesaki

Japanese manga artist and creator of Chibi Vampire (Karin) Yuna Kagesaki made her first visit to an American anime convention at Sakura-Con 2008 in Seattle, Washington. At two panel appearances, Kagesaki-sensei answered questions from panel moderator and TokyoPop Senior Editor Lillian Diaz-Pryzbyl and also answered questions from her fans in the audience.

The evolution of the horror genre

The literary genre known as horror has gone through some changes as of late and, for those among you who cling to the old traditions, these changes do not bode well. However, before going into that topic, it is best to first offer a brief explanation of what the horror genre is about.

Superstition Rules: Death, Murder, and Vampire Hunters

Although it's generally vampires who are considered deadly, those who hunt them down can be just as lethal, as the following modern-day stories reveal.

Fans of Buffy keep the fire burning

No one ever would have guessed when Buffy Summers first stabbed her way into American pop culture with the film version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that the young, blonde "Valley girl" cheerleader-cum-assassin of the undead would still be saving the world today--15 years after "dusting" her first demon.

Primary links

A Girl's Guide to Vampires

A Girl's Guide to Vampires at Amazon.com

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