What is a vampire?
On the surface, it’s an unnecessary question since, with Twilight and True Blood all the rage, everyone seems to have a keen sense of the undead. Yet that’s one question writers of vampire stories must contend with, and it’s one question I had never considered.
I had never thought much about vampires. I was never into the paranormal genre, the main reason being I’m not a fan of horror. I’m not a fan of violence, real or pretend, and since vampires have traditionally represented violence, I didn’t care to know them. I won’t go into the story about how one of my students gave me Twilight to read here. Suffice it to say, I liked what I read enough to begin seeking out other vampire stories. I eventually found my way to Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and Anne Rice’s Interview With the Vampire, and Charlaine Harris’s Southern Vampires series. The more vampire books I read the more I realized that there was no one way to describe a vampire. The question of ‘What is a vampire?’ is answered differently according to what authors want or need from their preternatural characters. What a grand revelation as I embarked on my own vampire stories.
I had a decision to make. Would I go the more traditional route and keep my vamplings asleep during the day, unable to go out in the sun, or would I take the more modern route of sunbeams and sparkles? In the beginning, I had no idea. I hopped on the computer (God bless the Internet) and searched vampire folklore to see how the undead have been traditionally defined. I was fascinated by what I found. Turns out that vampire legends have abounded for as long as there have been people to tell them, long before vampire stories were ever published. Who knew? There are vampire legends from all over the world, and while there are cultural differences, there were more than a few commonalities, and this is what I focused on—the commonalities.
So what is a vampire to me? How did I craft James’s vampire nature?
I tended to stay along more traditional lines in the Loving Husband Trilogy. One similarity between almost all vampire legends is that they’re nocturnal creatures. James is as well, sleeping during the day and living at night. He drinks blood. Now, how he choses to drink blood differs from other vampires, but let’s say that he does drink human blood. Their human bodies die as they are transformed (by the bite of another vampire) into a preternatural, immortal being. Again, pretty traditional. As to garlic and silver, well, I don’t know what to say about that. It’s true that traditionally (especially in the Slavic cultures) those are considered supreme weapons against the undead, but it seems to me that if you can live forever a little plant bulb or metal won’t harm you much. But that’s just me.
Part of the fun of writing in the paranormal genre is the ability to create your fantasy creatures however you want. If you want your vampire sitting on the sofa in broad daylight eating pizza (as Aidan does in the BBC series Being Human), then do it. There is no right way to create a vampire. As long as authors believe that the world they’re describing is true, then readers will follow. What is a vampire? The fun part is, as authors we get to decide for ourselves.
The Loving Husband Trilogy
Box Set- All Three Books
Meredith Allard
Genre: paranormal romance
Publisher: Copperfield Press
Date of Publication: 6/10/14
Number of pages: 782
Word Count: 265,000
Cover Artist: LFD Designs
Book Description:
Meredith Allard’s beloved best selling paranormal/historical Loving Husband Trilogy is now available together for the first time, with bonus material about the series. The collection includes the full texts of Her Dear & Loving Husband, Her Loving Husband’s Curse, and Her Loving Husband’s Return, plus a Q&A with Meredith Allard, series inspirations, and discussion questions. The Loving Husband Trilogy Box Set will please the most devoted James and Sarah Wentworth fans as well as fans new to the series.
Book One: Her Dear & Loving Husband
James Wentworth has a secret. He lives quietly in Salem, Massachusetts, making few ties with anyone. One night his private world is turned upside down when he meets Sarah Alexander, a dead ringer for his wife, Elizabeth. Though it has been years since Elizabeth's death, James cannot move on.
Sarah also has a secret. She is haunted by nightmares about the Salem Witch Trials, and every night she is awakened by visions of hangings, being arrested, and dying in jail. Despite the obstacles of their secrets, James and Sarah fall in love. As James comes to terms with his feelings for Sarah, he must dodge accusations from a reporter desperate to prove that James is not who, or what, he seems to be. Soon James and Sarah piece their stories together and discover a mystery that may bind them in ways they never imagined. Do vampires and witches live in Salem? Will James make the ultimate sacrifice to protect Sarah and prevent a new hunt from bringing hysteria to Salem again?
Book Two: Her Loving Husband’s Curse
How far will you go to protect the one you love?
Finally, after many long and lonely years, vampire James Wentworth's life is falling into place. Together with his wife, Sarah, the only woman he has ever loved, he has found the meaning behind her nightmares about the Salem Witch Trials, and now they are rebuilding the life they began together so long ago.
But the past is never far behind for the Wentworths. While Sarah is haunted by new visions, now about the baby she carried over three hundred years before, James is confronted with painful memories from his time with the Cherokee on the Trail of Tears. Through it all, the persistent reporter Kenneth Hempel reappears, still determined to prove that the undead walk the earth. If Hempel succeeds in his quest, James and Sarah will suffer. Will the curse of the vampire prevent James and Sarah from living their happily ever after?
Book Three: Her Loving Husband’s Return
What would you do to return to the only one you have ever loved?
Vampire James Wentworth’s secret is no longer a secret, and now he and his beloved wife, Sarah, have been separated. While suffering his own internment, James is reminded of his time with Japanese-Americans in the Manzanar Relocation Camp during World War II, and he cannot allow the past to repeat itself. With the help of his friends—Chandresh, Jocelyn, Timothy, even the irreverent Geoffrey—James learns what it means to return, and he is determined to return to his Sarah no matter the challenges—or the consequences. In the end, it may be up to Olivia, the most powerful of witches, to grant James’s most fervent wish. Will James and Sarah be reunited once and for all despite the madness surrounding them?
Excerpt from Book One
PROLOGUE
I am looking lovingly into
the eyes of a man, though I cannot see his face because it is featureless, like
a blank slate. We are standing in front of a wooden house with narrow
clapboards, and there are diamond-paned casement windows and a steep pitched
roof with two gables pointing at the laughing, hidden moon. I am certain I hear
someone singing sweet nothings to us from the sky. From the light of the few
jewel stars I can see the halo of his hair, like the halo of an angel, and even
if I cannot see his eyes I know they look at me, into me. I stand on my toes,
he is much taller than me, and I point up my face and he kisses me. As the
warmth of his lips melts into mine, making me weak from the inside out, I feel
my knees give from the thrilling lightness his touch brings. I know the face I
cannot see is beautiful, like the lips I feel. His hands press me into him,
clutching me closer, closer, unwilling to let me go. I grip him with equal
strength, wishing he would carry me inside, yet I cannot bring myself to break
our embrace.
“I shall
never leave you ever,” he whispers in my ear. I promise him the same.
I do not know how I have
been so fortunate to have this man in my life, but here he is, before me,
wanting me. I am overcome with the joy of him.
CHAPTER 1
Sarah Alexander didn’t know
what was waiting for her in Salem, Massachusetts. She had moved there to escape
the smog and the smugness of Los Angeles, craving the dulcet tones of a small
town, seeking a less complicated life. Her first hint of the supernatural world
came the day she moved into her rented brick house near the historic part of
town, close to the museums about the witch trial days, not far from the easy,
wind-blown bay. As the heavy-set men hauled her furniture inside, her landlady
leaned close and told her to beware.
“If you hear
sounds in the night it’s ghosts,” the landlady whispered, glancing around to be
sure no one, human or shadow, could hear. “The spirits of the innocent victims
of the witch hunts still haunt us. I can feel them stirring now. God rest
them.”
Sarah didn’t
know what to say. She had never been warned about ghosts before. The landlady
peered at her, squinting to see her better.
“You’re a
pretty girl,” the old woman said. “Such dark curls you have.” She still spoke
as if she were telling a secret, and Sarah had to strain to hear. “You’re from
California?”
“I moved
there after I got married,” Sarah said.
“Where’s your
husband?”
“I’m divorced
now.”
“And your
family is here?”
“In Boston. I
wanted to live close to my family, but I didn’t want to move back to the city.
I’ve always wanted to visit Salem, so I thought I’d live here awhile.”
The landlady
nodded. “Boston,” she said. “Some victims of the witch trials were jailed in
Boston.”
The landlady
was so bent and weak looking, her fragile face lined like tree rings, that
Sarah thought the old woman had experienced the hysteria in Salem during the
seventeenth century. But that was silly, Sarah reminded herself. The Salem
Witch Trials happened over three hundred years ago. There was no one alive now
who had experienced that terror first hand. Sarah wanted to tell the landlady
how she believed she had an ancestor who died as a victim of the witch hunts,
but she didn’t say anything then.
“Yes, they’re
here,” the landlady said, staring with time-faded eyes at the air above their
heads, as if she saw something no one else could see. “Beware, Sarah. The
ghosts are here. And they always come out at night.”
The landlady
shook as if she were cold, though it was early autumn and summer humidity still
flushed the air. When Sarah put her arm around the old woman to comfort her,
she felt her skin spark like static. She rubbed her hands together, feeling the
numbness even after the old woman pulled away.
“It’s all
right,” Sarah said. “I won’t be frightened by paranormal beings. I don’t
believe in ghosts.”
The landlady
laughed. “Salem may cure you of that.”
For a moment Sarah wondered if
she made a mistake moving there, but she decided she wouldn’t let a
superstitious old woman scare her away. She thought about her new job in the
library at Salem State College—Humanities I liaison, go-to person for English
studies, well worth the move across the country. She saw the tree-lined,
old-fashioned neighborhood and the comforting sky. She heard the lull of bird
songs and the distant whisper of the sea kissing the shore. She felt a rising
tranquility, like the tide of the ocean waves at noon, wash over her. It was a
contentment she had never known before, not in Boston, never in Los Angeles.
She was fascinated by Salem, looking forward to knowing it better, certain she
was exactly where she needed to be, whatever may come.
Sarah’s first days in the
library were hectic since it was the start of an autumn term. She spent her
shifts on the main floor, an open, industrial-style space of bright lights,
overhead beams, and windows that let in white from the sun and green from the
trees abundant everywhere on campus. Across from the librarians’s desk, a
combined circulation and reference area, was a lounge of comfortable chairs in
soothing grays and blues where some students socialized using their inside
voices while others stalked like eagle-eyed hunters, searching the stacks or
the databases.
By Wednesday
afternoon, as she saw the short-tempered rain clouds march across the Salem
sky, Sarah thought she would have to buy a car soon. After driving and dodging
in nail-biting Los Angeles traffic for ten years, she liked the freedom of
walking the quiet roads from home to work, watching in wonder as the leaves
turned from summer green to an autumn fade of red, rust, and gold. But she had
been living in the sunshine on the west coast for ten years, and she had
forgotten about the sudden anger of New England thunderstorms. They could
appear just like that, a crack of noise overhead, then a gray flannel blanket
covered the sky as fast as you could blink your eyes, water splashing all
around, wetting you when you did not want to be wet, and she was caught
unprepared. She held out her hand and shook her head when she felt the drops
splash her palm. Jennifer Mandel’s voice sang out behind her.
“Need a
lift?”
“Please.”
Sarah wiped
her palm on her skirt, grateful once again for Jennifer’s assistance. Jennifer
had been the head librarian at the college for five years, and she had taken
Sarah under her wing, showing her where everything was, introducing her to the
rest of the staff, answering her questions. There was something almost odd
about Jennifer’s intuition—she always seemed to know when Sarah needed her, like
a clairvoyant magic trick. They sprinted to the parking lot, trying to avoid
the sudden splats of rain soaking their thin blouses through, and they
clambered into Jennifer’s white Toyota, laughing like schoolgirls jumping in
puddles. Jennifer drove the curve around Loring Avenue to Lafayette Street, the
main road to and from the college.
“Where were
you before you came here?” Jennifer asked. “You’re obviously not used to the
rain.”
“I worked at
UCLA.”
“A small town
like Salem must seem dreary after living in the big city.”
Sarah looked
at Jennifer, saw the compassion in her eyes, the understanding smile, so she
said just enough to make herself understood. “I’m recently divorced.”
Jennifer held
up her hand. “You don’t need to explain. I have two ex-husbands myself.”
They drove
quietly, letting the sound of the car’s accelerator and the rain tapping the
windshield fill the space. As Sarah watched the small-town scene drift past,
she thought it might not be so bad to drive in Salem. Everything back east, the
roads, the shops, the homes, was built on an old-time scale, narrower and
smaller than they were out west. But here people slowed when you wanted to
merge into their lane and they stopped at stop signs, so different from L.A.
where they’d run you over sooner than let you pass.
“Why don’t
you come over tomorrow night?” Jennifer asked. “We’re having a get-together at
my mother’s shop.” She leaned closer to Sarah and whispered though they were
alone in the car. “I should probably tell you, and I’ll understand if you think
this is too weird, but my mother and I are witches.”
Sarah studied
Jennifer, her hazel eyes, her long auburn hair, her friendly smile. “You don’t
look like a witch,” she said.
“You mean the
kind with black hair and a nose wart? The kind that fly around on broomsticks?
Not that kind of witch.”
“You mean
you’re Wiccan?”
“Yes, I
practice the Wiccan religion, among other things. I’m the high priestess of my
coven. I’m also licensed to perform weddings here in Massachusetts, in case you
ever need someone to preside over a wedding for you.”
Sarah
laughed. “I just got divorced. I won’t be getting married again any time soon.”
She paused to watch the drizzle slip and slide on the windows. “I’m surprised
there really are witches in Salem.”
“Ironic,
isn’t it? The city known for hanging witches is now a haven for mystics.”
Jennifer shook her head, her expression tight. “Is this too much information? I
don’t usually tell someone a few days after I’ve met her that I’m Wiccan, but
you have a positive energy. You don’t seem like someone who’s going to assume
I’m a Satanist who loves human sacrifices.”
“I don’t
mind. I’m just surprised. I’ve never known a witch before.”
“There are
all sorts of interesting people you could meet around here.” Jennifer nudged
Sarah with her elbow. “So will you come tomorrow night?”
“I don’t
know, Jennifer.”
“You don’t
need to participate in the rituals. Come make some friends. I think you’ll like
the other witches in my coven. They’re good people.”
A Wiccan
ceremony did sound odd, Sarah thought, but she had always been fascinated by
different religions and cultures. Librarians had to keep learning—a healthy
curiosity was a job necessity. And it would be nice to know some people in
Salem, even if they were witches.
As they
continued down Lafayette Street, Sarah saw the sign for Pioneer Village and she
added it to her mental to-do list. “I haven’t had a chance to see much of this
part of town since I’ve been here,” she said.
“How about a
quick tour then?”
“What about
the rain?”
Jennifer
turned right down Derby Street. “I’ve lived here my whole life. A little water
doesn’t bother me.”
Jennifer
drove down one tree-lined street, then down another street, and another until
Sarah didn’t know where she was. Though Witch City was small, Sarah was still
learning her way around. She tried to gauge her surroundings and saw the tall,
white lines of the Peabody-Essex Museum, then further down was the Hawthorne
Hotel. Past that was the brick, colonial-looking Salem Maritime National Historic
Site. As she watched the history flip past, like a stack of photographs from
time gone by, she noticed a house she thought she knew though she was sure she
hadn’t been down that way before. The one that caught her attention had wooden
clapboards, diamond-paned casement windows, and two gables on the roof. It was
old, though it didn’t seem to be a museum as the other old buildings were.
“What is that
house?” she asked. “It looks familiar.”
“James
Wentworth lives there.”
“Do you know
him?”
Jennifer’s answer
was stilted, as if she considered each word, weighed it, measured it, decided
yes or no about it, before she let it drop from her lips. “He teaches at the
college. He—his family—has owned this house for generations. It’s over three
hundred years old, one of the oldest standing homes in Salem.”
Jennifer
slowed the car so they could get a better look as she drove past. “Does it
still look familiar?” she asked.
“Yes. Even
that crooked oak tree in front seems right. I can picture the man I dream about
standing in front there kissing me.”
“What
dreams?” Jennifer gripped the steering wheel more tightly and her eyes
brightened. “My mother’s friend Martha is great at dream interpretation. She’s
done a world of good for me.” She winked at Sarah. “And you dream about a man?
Is he a good looking man?”
Sarah pulled
her arms around her chest, wishing she could take back her casual reference,
afraid she had already said too much.
“Do you have
a lot of dreams?”
“Yes,” Sarah
said. But that was all she could manage. When Jennifer had waited long enough
and Sarah had to offer something more, all she could say was, “It’s not a big
deal. I just thought I knew the house from somewhere.”
“A lot of
houses around here look the same,” Jennifer said.
Sarah looked
at the houses, the tall, Federal-style ones, the Victorian ones, the brick
ones, the modern-looking ones. Suddenly, as they drove around the green of
Salem Common, the rain cleared, the sun brightened, and the clouds flittered
away across the bay.
“That must be
it,” she said.
She lowered
the car window so she could smell the wet air. Though she missed the rain when
she lived in Los Angeles, at that moment she was glad to see the serene blue
reflection of the northeastern sky again.
They drove the rest of the way
in silence.
About the Author:
Meredith Allard is the author of the best-selling novels The Loving Husband Trilogy, Victory Garden, Woman of Stones, and My Brother’s Battle (Copperfield Press). She received her B.A. and M.A. degrees in English from California State University, Northridge. She has taught writing to students aged ten to sixty, and she has taught creative writing and writing historical fiction seminars at Learning Tree University, UNLV, and the Las Vegas Writers Conference. She lives in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Website: www.meredithallard.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/copperfield101
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