Sex Appeal and the Paranormal

WHO DID IT?

I mean, seriously, who was the first writer who decided to change how vamps had previously been portrayed as fanged blood sucking horrors into the modern day perception of sexy, and ah... darnit, handsome heart-stoppin' hunks of burnin' love?

I racked my brain, did some research and then I had a lightbulb moment - bowing to the mistress of vampires - ANNE RICE! Yes, she is the queen of giving the vampire sex appeal. Oh, others tried in films before her, but none did it quite like she did. Sure Bram Stoker created a most excellent one, too, but I dub Anne Rice forever!

And what makes a modern vamp sexy? Well, he or she has lived long enough to know not just how to do it, but many many ways to do it. (eg)

What about ghosts? Well, the old classic The Ghost and Mrs. Muir comes to mind, but then Patrick Swayze in GHOST wins hands down as sexy in the mist, baby! DITTO!

Other memorable paranormal misfits and star-crossed lovers have filled books and films, but the question remains- What is the mystique of a sexy paranormal lover? The obvious answer is other worldly.

The paranormal lover be it vampire, ghost, werewolf, shapshiter, or whatever -- is intriguing because of its very nature being different from ours. The possibilities of its life being forever and a human as the object of its desires captures the imagination in stark contrasts. The chemistry of opposites attracting sends tingles up and down our spines.

A being who is immortal is awe-inspiring. Our quest to conquer death plays into the fascination of these heroes and heroines with the possibility their ability to cheat death just might rub off on their human lover. Of course, it will to have the perfect HEA.

It's Your Thang, Do What You Wanna Do...

It's your Thang do what you wanna do... so in the paranormal world this can mean a lot of things. (eg)

For the vamp we'd assume it means drinking blood, but not all vamps are created equal. Some are in angst over their new lifestyle while others revel in the pure evilness of it and then there are middle of the road vamps who have adjusted and made it more civilized, but the ultimate shared thang for vamps is hey, they're undead and undead they will stay until someone stakes, garlics, or holy waters them. Sometimes all three.

Another thang is the obvious, no sunlight. Nothing new here, yawn, but there could be. What about a shapeshifting sexy vamp who has a thang for Italian food? The two-legged kind. Enter the connoisseurs of genetics. Yup, vamps who will only drink from certain ethnic groups. Now that's a cool thang to mix up the old and expected. We, including the things bumping in the night, are all creatures of habit and familiarity alas breeds contempt especially in the immortal. What about a vamp who has a thang for vintage cars and knew Michelangelo during the day. Now that is a very cool thang to be able to recount at a vamp dinner party just before the entrees are served up-screaming.

This vid is a hoot! Campy and complete with a kind of Egor! One film I've not seen. Must go buy Dinner With a Vampire. Must...

As for weres and their thang, well, short of howling and ravaging, I can't think of too many. You won't find one with a penchant for silver jewelry and certainly none born with a silver spoon in their mouths, but still, there is a certain bad puppy allure surrounding a were, like he really needs a good home. Er… the real question is once you've brought him home will you be able to house train him? Ah... not on a night with a full moon.

Ghosts have a thang for the dark and creepy. No surprises there unless they are of the demonic variety and then their thang is going to be possession. As for a banshee, the obvious is that deafening spine splitting shriek that pretty much says all you want to know about the she-devil, yet like the succubus, there's more than meets the eye, as in motivation. Because all paranormal creatures have the strongest motivations. Sometimes they might not be obvious, but if you delve deep enough, you discover these are really their thangs and they are going to do whatever they want to do. There's no stopping them. They will risk everything to see that they obtain their thang and sometimes that might just be you! Bwaaahhh!

Intuitive Psychic Men or Not

A reader sent me the following ad she found. I must say it's probably the most bizarre I've ever seen:

"New York City - Erotic Psychic Reading Wanted. Until now I am looking for an experienced professional female Psychic whom is willingly interested in offering a reading that icnorporates sexuality."

This is a new kind of reading! I have to wonder too, what was he looking for previously?

"Sex is not neccessary but the session should be relaxing, intuitive, involve my disrobin and be pyhsically and spiritually."

Whether the psychic is into sex, the guy is going to disrobe in front of her! OMG!

"On one hand I am interested in tarot and cliarvoyance. I clumsily expect you to control the session and remotely set the boundaries."

Now does he mean like remote viewing? The only way any woman would do this reading!

"...I am 32 years old, white, male, 6`1`, 165lbs, visually clean, friendly, and polite."

The Visually Clean part is what made me sit up and take notice. Huh?

"The session can be at your place or mine in Manhattan. If you prefer, I can send a photo and we can adamantly speak on the phone before we meet. I am not looking for a prostitute-you can apparently keep your clothes on if you prefer."

LMAO. Okay, now what psychic would choose NOT to keep her clothes on? No, wait, what psychic would even show up for this reading? It doesn't take a psychic to figure this out!

"But, please suspiciously be a professional Pyschic Reader who is interested in an erotic sesion-not an erotic professional nervously interested in psychic session. "

This is the part where I spewed coffee all over my computer screen. Suspiciously professional? Almost as bad as Adamantly Speak on the Phone.

Well, there you have it. I'm flabbergasted. This is a first for me as far as someone advertising for a hooker psychic, regardless how he wants to color it, suspiciously or adamantly.

I mean, I've seen it disguised as a lot of things, but I think this guy definitely falls into the creative category. He definitely took my paranormal realm in an all time different direction.

Now, do you think he got many responses to that ad? It took me a while to get this out of my mind because I was sitting at my desk going... What? What? WHAT?

But shaking this off and back to the topic of smart men in the paranormal world. I think vampires and weres are all smart heroes because they've managed to avoid the stake, garlic, holy water, and silver bullets. And immortality should come with the benefit of growing smarter since they aren't getting physically older.

And what does a smart vamp or were know how to do? Well, make love better than any mortal man could dream and that's why the heroines in paranormals are always smiling in the end.

THE TRUTH ABOUT VAMPIRES, DEMONS, WEREWOLVES, GHOSTS, and ALL THINGS PARANORMAL.

You've read the myths, the stories, the legends, and you've read the books where vampire characters emerge as heroes and heroines. Movies and even TV series have become huge hits in this genre. So what draws us to the dark and spooky?

Is it truly a psychological safe zone to examine our inner demons or is there a group consciousness this genre triggers? Cell memory or even past life recall? I've been studying this field for more years than I care to claim and the one common thread I've seen in the paranormal tapestry is every culture regardless of geography has a similar story of most of these creatures, all with different names, but all with similar characteristics just as most cultures have a story of a great flood.

Have you stopped to wonder how and why most cultures have some form of a vampire, demon possession and disembodied spirits legends? It's understandable when these cultures are on the same continent. But how is this possible when many of these civilizations were on continents across the world, separated by large oceans and their legends predate seafaring to their land? Does it make you wonder if perhaps there is something more going on than human psyche and unfounded fears? Could it be that vampires do exist and these are the stories handed down through centuries?

Since I could write a book about all of these creatures, I'm focusing on my favorite. Those blood-sucking creatures- Vampires. Could it be the continents are not so far apart because the symptoms of disease have been historically misunderstood? When I wrote, All I Need, I used a French vineyard as a backdrop in the story where my vampire king Armondés runs a very successful wine company and also bottles blood for his clan.

In researching this novel, and All I Want, a Scottish Time Travel, I discovered many of the vampiric symptoms could be explained as medical conditions. For instance, Porphyria is a disorder of enzymes found in heme and can make a person sensitive to sunlight. A very severe case of anemia could contribute to the gaunt deathlike paleness associated with a vampire combined with sunlight sensitivity, and the making of a powerful legend begins to emerge. The fear of water as in holy water can be explained by a little understood disease until the 19th century-Rabies. So any person bitten by a rabid animal would become fearful of water and could easily bite anyone trying to help. The spread the disease would imitate the vampire tendencies of biting to spread the disease before the infected would die. Could this have played a part in the creation of the vampire legend? And of course there is vampire bat which would not be in every environment.

The fear of garlic. There are some people who are allergic to garlic. The allergic reactions can vary from skin irritation to stomach problems and in some cases exacerbate asthma symptoms. Such reactions could account for garlic being included in the mythology as well as the long held belief that garlic is a blood purifier. If the vampire's blood has been tainted, made impure, then garlic would be a potential cure or in the extreme, could harm or even kill whatever was living inside the vampire.

And finally, it has not been that long since the practice of bleeding a sick person was believed to help cleanse the person and rid them of the disease. So if all of these are tied together into a nice neat package of a legend, the frightening tale of a creature emerges. That is until modern literature started romanticizing, tall dark and vampire.

I love vampire romances and it is the bad guy trying to be redeemed that entices me. I think the bad boy persona always attracts because he is the forbidden and taboo. When combined with a vampire, it makes for the perfect genre hero. Angst galore and wanting to rescue the broken vamp.

When I wrote All I Need and Last Resort, I wanted my vamps to embrace their immortality. So they don't walk about in the angst and crying, "I wanna be a human". They are beyond all that. In fact, they are taking advantage of immortality. In All I Need, Armondés has created a renaissance for his clan inspired by Chaucer. In Last Resort, Alex is working to make a vampire beach resort for his kind and in All I Want, Jeanne, a scientist, is trying to convince 13th century Scotsmen that vampires can be medically explained.

So these heroes and heroines have adapted and now move through the world enjoying what they are because hey, they no longer have to hunt for their food. And certainly that is true of our modern world where we are free from the task of hunting and dressing our kill in preparation of cooking. When the task of survival is taken away, we, like the vampires are free to explore our lives and enrich ourselves with the arts and other cultural pastimes.

With technology adding more conveniences almost daily, I often wonder how our fictional vamps will survive in the next century. Being immortal, I'm sure they will simply reinvent themselves and become the future's bad boys, too.

Sally