The R-O-M-A-N-C-E of ETERNAL LOVE

In the famous words of Freddie Mercury, "Who Wants to Live Forever? Who dares to love forever?"

And his song was immortalized (sorry for the pun) by the movie The Highlander followed by the TV series.

One thing about the paranormal, immortality is a big plus when it comes to creating the mood for paranormal fiction.

The idea of remaining young forever appeals to us in oh so many ways. Lifetimes to do all the things we will never have time to do in just one human lifespan. Tall dark and sexy who can never die is beyond appealing. Such a character captures our imagination. Especially when he is completely undone by the heroine.

A man who has lived hundreds of years, had countless lovers and yet, all it takes is the heroine to look at him and he is just as vulnerable as a mortal. Perhaps moreso. And how is he going to make sure his beloved lives forever with him? If he's vampire, we know how he's going to do that. Same thing for a werewolf. Both beings have been well-defined in movies and literature so we have a cultural understanding on their worlds.

Back to Freddie and his song and The Highlander. What tugged at my heart the most with Duncan besides his incredible sexy good looks was the fact his love could not transform his beloved into an immortal. He was doomed to fall hard and then suffer the eventuality that he would indeed live forever (if he could keep his head on his shoulders) but his love would age and die.



So when Who Wants to Live Forever was selected for the movie and TV series, it was a perfect blending of that angst the immortal Highlander was constantly fighting. A battle he would always lose.

Fortunately in ROMANCE fiction, our heroes always find a way to take their heroine into that world of immortality and never have to suffer that loss. If they do, it's merely temporary because we all know there will be HEA (Happily Ever After) ending for our immortal pair.