Dark Beauties

I guess I’ve always been attracted to the dark side, even when I was really young my favorite things were witchy, spooky and creepy. I can remember rushing home every day after to school to watch Scooby Doo my all time favorite cartoon. I laugh at my husband because he said he couldn’t watch Scooby when he was little because it scared him. He still isn’t a big fan of scary movies either. Though he can handle going to all the crazy Halloween haunted houses when I can’t. Weird.

Anyway, I digress.

When I was a child my bookshelves were lined with all kinds of creepy, spooky and scary ghost stories and kids books about Halloween and anything just a little supernatural. By the time I was 10 I was already reading Steven King and Dean Koontz.

I loved watching Tales from the Darkside, Twilight Zone, and of course- reruns of The Munsters and The Addams Family. Morticia Addams and Lily Munster were idols of mine, dark, scary, beautiful. Especially the original Morticia (not so much Angelica Houston).

Then later came Elvira- now there was a frightening figure of femininity that men everywhere lusted after.

The “Otherness” portrayed by these women was always intensely sexual. Lily was a nurturing mother but like mother nature her sexuality was apparent. Morticia was always appeared so slinky and darkly beautiful, and the refreshing flirtation between her and Gomez is something to hope for in a relationship isn’t it? And Elvira, well, she was just sex incarnate wasn’t she?

Did you know that Lily and Herman Munster were the first television couple to actually appear in bed together and Morticia and Gomez were always sexy and flirtatious while all the other couples on television sit coms during that time period (1960s) had no apparent sex lives and were never seen in bed together. With television showing such bland lifestyles how could you not want dark sexiness in your world?

For a little girl who dreamed of wild times and fantastic places emulating the dark beauties promised a much more interesting life.

And now look at the popularity of paranormal erotica and paranormal erotic romance today.

These books are flying off the shelves. A lot of people are catching on to the allure of the dark side of sex and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

The Appeal of Darkness

Why are we drawn to the paranormal? Perhaps because it is the Other, it is the great unknown. The lure of the darkness that resides inside us all.

Are Others real? Are there really paranormal creatures that exist?

Who knows, but some of us sure like to believe.

Maybe we just need an escape from the everyday existence that has become so…ordinary. In today’s world people want to stand out and be noticed or at least experience something that is different. Perhaps that’s why so many of us turn to the world of the supernatural for an escape from the everyday.

Wouldn’t it be great to have super powers? Or to be immortal? Super strong? Have mind control? Or just be super seductive and a fabulous lover (we can all dream right)?

Of all supernatural creatures, vampires seem to be the most seductive. People are drawn to the vampire more than any other creature of myth and fantasy. Vampires grace the pages of books and appear on the movie and television screen over and over again, each new vampire a source of amusement and desire to us. But why? What is the everlasting attraction of the vampire?

Before the 19th century vampires were just mindless monsters, myths and legends that were horrible and frightening, not sexy, not desirable. Literature changed all that.

Consider this description from the introduction of Blood Read: The Vampire as Metaphor in Contemporary Culture written by Joan Gordon and Veronica Hollinger.

[The vampire is] “an ambiguously coded figure, a source of erotic anxiety and corrupt desire, the literary vampire is one of the most powerful archetypes bequeathed to us from the imagination of the nineteenth century.”

Vampires were turned into seductive and inherently sexy creatures that we just haven’t been able to get enough of. The unknown allure is there, evil has become sexy, darkness is beautiful. Once the monsters of myth and legend were shunned for their differences but today we embrace them because they are different, because they are Other.

Our modern society is full of disquiet, pain, suffering, depression, things that spiral out of control-real monsters and horrors face us every day on the news.

In entertainment we want monsters that we can control, monsters…Others that are appealing in their difference and offer us an escape. The vampire offers us all that and more.

I love many creatures of the Other world but the vampire is my first love and will always hold the top spot in my monster loving heart.

In my fiction, the characters are more often than not Others, with a vampire playing either the hero or the heroine of the story.

If you love vampires as much as I do be sure to drop by Fang-tastic Books www.fang-tasticbooks.blogspot.com for book reviews, guest posts, interviews and lots of giveaways with authors that write vampire and other paranormal romances and urban fantasy books

Lead Me On Tour Finale and Giveaway

From: lindarenee@hotmail.com
Date: Sun, 13 Aug 2011 08:13:03 -0700
To: anna_g@gmail.com

Hey sis,

This is in response to those last ten e-mails that you've sent me about my lack of a sex life-- you know, those e-mails that I've been ignoring. You're going to be proud of me-- if you even believe what I'm about to tell you. Do you remember my friend Suzanne from college? Last night I went to her wedding. Do you also remember Eric? You know, that guy that I was googly over for awhile in my sophomore year? Well, I ran into Eric after the wedding... and there were still sparks, so many years later.

Yes, that's right. I got it on with my old flame.

Think that's hard to believe?Eric was there with his ex-boyfriend. Yes, you read that right.

And I'm just going to let your imagination go from there.

Thanks for the push, my nosy, bossy big sister!

Love as always,
Linda
Sent from my iPhone

Be sure to come back for the 4th tour in the Erotic Me Series starting Dec 1

Lead Me On
By Lauren Hawkeye
Publish Date November 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-426-88550-1

Linda doesn’t know why she agreed to attend an old friend’s wedding, or the after party where she encounters her old flame, Eric. She’s as attracted to him now as she was in college…and even more aroused when she meets his captivating friend Nate.

Unlikely as it seems, Linda can’t deny the two sexy men are interested in her—and that she wants them both, too. She’s determined to follow the night through with them, wherever it may lead…

Book three of Lauren Hawkeye’s Erotic Me series.

Lauren Hawkeye is a writer, theatre enthusiast, knitting aficionado and animal lover who lives in the shadows of the great Rocky Mountains of Alberta, Canada.

She’s older than she looks—really—and younger than she feels—most of the time—and she loves to explore the journeys that take women through life in her stories.

http://www.laurenhawkeye.com

Giveaway Time

A winner will be chosen in mid December after all tour stops have been completed.

The Prize Basket will contain a bag of Kicking Horse Coffee, Le Chocolatier chocolates, Rocky Mountain Soap Co. things, and several other goodies Lauren throws in.

This contest open to US and Canada Shipping.

One winner will be chosen.

To enter fill out the form