Now imagine all this taking place in front of your comfy chair, because all this stuff is your Saturday morning cartoons. That's Vlad. Dude was twisted.

*edit* I also recall he did it to an estimated 10k plus people. Once he did it to a whole army to scare off an invader by breaking the morale of the invading troops. I think it worked.

*edit2* The ruins of his castle is a tourist spot now. I find that funny.

There is definitely some cool vampire stuff.

Unfortunately I have to go through 99% of this crap...



To find the 1% of the good stuff.

Patricia Briggs does a series on Werewolves that has vampires that aren't actually immortal. They die, just very, very slowly. And most of the ones that live to the older ages are nuts, which makes for a fun vampire.

 

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Yeah, as I said there are a few exceptions to the rule, but the majority of vampire stories keep the immortality in tact while changing anything else to fit their story.

When I was a teenager I read the Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice (up until Memnoch, boy was that a POS) and I remember that the immortality and strength was a tangible drawing point for me. I didn't pick up another vampire related book until I read The Hollows at age 25. At that point the immortality, super strength, etc. weren't the appeal of vampires anymore, it was more the ability to get the fantasy themed books I enjoy in a modern setting.

I've read dozens of vampire books and hundreds of vampire/witch/werewolf/etc. etc. books since then and the drawing point is still the modern day fantasy setting - not to mention they tend to be short, easy reads and I've become sinfully lazy in that regard. I honestly don't know if my predilection for romance plots is something I brought in with me or if it was learned.

 

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to scare off the turks, after fighting with them, he set up a forest of them on the spikes. took the dead, wounded and prisoners from the battle and used them. it amounted to something like 23,000 people. and that was only one instance. he killed everyone this way for even the slightest transgression. he would eat among the people he'd done it to.

 

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Best "vampire novel" ever is Carpe Jugulum

 

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I agree,

look I like urban fantasy as much as the next guy.

give me Dresden, Iron Druid, the Hollows, great series, I haven't read the sookie books because I just haven't.

but when I go check the fantasy section of Amazon on my kindle and I have to scroll through Sookie book 241, and stuff that is romance novel crap because they put vampires or werewolves in it. that's bull. that's a romance book not a fantasy book. both are fiction.

Rule of thumb they should follow:

If a book that is fictional is bought mostly by lonely single women in their 40s... that's a romance book and should be filed there.

If a book is bought mostly by teens, and adult men, that's a fantasy/sci-fi.

 

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Tons of Urban Fantasy novels are shelved in romance, even some that fit better in the fantasy section.

I've read dozens and dozens of UF series and most of them are more fantasy than romance. Go read some real romance novels and you will see the clear distinction. Though, more and more romance authors are coming over to the paranormal side and the number of pure paranormal romances is increases as quickly as UF and paranormal YA have been increasing.

UF is getting big enough that it could support its own section rather than being split between fantasy, romance, YA and horror.

 

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i'm offended by your notion that women don't love fantasy/sci-fi just as much as men do.

 

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