24 March 2019

The Future of Vampire Stories (a continuing resolution) Part 2

With a welcome weekend off for the St. Patrick's Day celebrations (There are no naturally occurring Irish vampires, thankfully!), we return with Part 2 of our continuing resolution on the future of Vampire literature: A look into the Future Society.

The 3rd book, SUNSET, in the Stefan Szekely Trilogy opens in 2099 and extends into the 2100s, remarking often on the situation in the world and especially the Empire of Europa, born of the expanded Hungarian Empire, led by the vampire Emperor. His Holiness chastises his governing council, lectures them on how He has improved the world from the way it was in the days of His transformation in 2014:

Case #4

His Holiness, Emperor Stefan: “It needs to be controlled, this world of ours. I agree. Too much and for too long the scientists and the inventors sought to expand only leisure and sloth, leaving the masses unemployed and starving. Those who could work willingly worked for the lowest possible wage. Others were slaves of sloth: no will to enter the night, to make something, no, only the attention to divertissements. For each man and each woman must have purpose in their existence, so we have given it to them: make good your efforts to bear children prior to your transformation, raise them to obey, honor our traditions and maintain our heritage. A logical scheme. Look how we smashed the towers of commerce, those thirty-floor skyscrapers that were not a part of our traditions and our heritage. We return to the common architecture style which represents the best of our land, the best of our history—true art! And we should continue to make works of art and beauty and sing songs that glorify the empire and praise the Most High. Diligently make your specified production each night. Enjoy a sport or celebrate music in your hibernation. Notice the world around you and your place in it. Nothing occurs in isolation. This is what we do within the span of our existence. We do not seek to advance society into some strange new world full of strange objects and stranger beliefs. This is our home. Let us keep it clean and dark.”

Case #5

Later we meet Oklahoma grave digger Bucky Denham and learn of the wars that have been on-going in Europe: the Ukrainian front on the east and the front on the west coast in Frisia (northern Netherlands):

    “Oh, that?” Bucky thumbed to his shoulder. “I was o’er in Frisia for a year, fightin th’ Europa vampires. Got this here wound ’nd they sent me home. Yeah, don’t hurt now, but shee-yit shore did when it was still burning, I mean li’l blue flames rising from each hole, like to beggin for someone ta kill me right off. But I got ta th’ hospice in time ’nd they put out th’ flames ’nd bandaged me tight. Worst year of my life, lemme tell ya.” He shrugged to show it didn’t hurt now. “But they get me good now, takin half whatever I make diggin graves for folks no matter I did my service. My pops kicked off while I was o’er there. My baby boy had with a gal down the street, too.”
. . . 

   “Yessiree. Them vampire brigades come at us during night, firing flares ’nd shee-yit at us. Then they got th’ Black Storm going ’nd they started attacking during th’ day. But it weren’t like no day, black clouds coverin th’ sun, dark as night. They could go out then. Nothin we threw at ’em ever did much. We tried silver bullets but they just went straight through ’em. Silver’s too dang ’spensive. We had ta get some sabers ’nd go fer th' heads. Lop off a head 
’nd they stopped cold dead. Yep, true dead. We heard they kept ’em starved of blood then released ’em at us so they’d tear after us, ya know, ta get our blood. Ya never saw no more gore than th’ battlefields of Frisia. I mean, arms ’nd legs ’nd heads laying ever’where. So many gyawdamn crows peckin at shit.”

Case #6

Finally, as expected, more and more fundamental tasks will be taken over by automation - robots - thereby leaving humans to enjoy their leisure. Sometimes the technology works too well, or doesn't work at all:

    Twice a surveillance drone approached him. Finally, it flashed a red warning: MAXIMUM WARNINGS EXCEEDED. A security patrol drove up beside him, hovering over the pavement.
    “What’re you up to, fella?” asked the robot in a life-like voice.
    “I like the scenery on this street,” he said in as calm a voice as he could conjure, imagining the robot might detect voice stress. “So I’ve been walking this way for my daily exercise.”
    “Residents have complained. Please choose another route.”
    “Yes, of course. Sorry. I meant no harm.”
    “No harm is not no harm,” the robot replied like a Zen koan, eyes blinking. “Residents feel harm even if you intend no harm.”
    “I suppose that’s true,” he said with a smile.
    “Please choose a different route. You are forbidden from this route from now.” The robot’s arm telescoped out from the hovering vehicle, a tablet attached to its hand. 
    “Apply chip here.”
    He was wary of the authenticity of his chip now and stepped back from the neighborhood patrol. He turned his back to the robot and walked quickly down the slope, around the curve, back to his Hoverina parked on the street—recharged with his old paper money converted to credits at a bank, where he was advised to get a replacement chip since his was not connecting properly to the grid.

Case #7

Toward the end of the novel (not to give away any spoilers), a major character travels to Moscow and we see that Russia has not suffered the degradation of a vampire society:

This train ran smoothly, she noticed, a much better vehicle than the old one they had ridden from Budapest. Someone mentioned the train sailed over jets of compressed air. She was entering a modern world. Arriving in Moscow, she could not believe the architecture that had sprouted up like a great forest. There were the Seven Colossi marking the old wall towers of ancient Muscovy, silver office buildings rising fifty floors, topped with great communication towers. Nothing like them existed in Budapest or anywhere else in Europe; the empire disdained anything modern. In the center of the city stood the 800-meter tall statue of Saint Vladimir, savior of the republic. Below the feet of the statue and its mountainous hill of earth and granite blocks, the walls of the Kremlin were crumbling, finally allowed to decay as an unwanted symbol of the Communist era.

She exited Okhotny Ryad station at the north end of Red Square and found the streets crisscrossed by driverless trolleys, stopping to pick up anyone who waved. After strolling the square and assuring that St. Basil’s Cathedral was still as colorful as she remembered—it was, undamaged; Lenin’s Tomb, however, had been occupied by the latest iconic figure—she rode to the west, then north, past the huge Bolshoi Theater extension—the arts were flourishing again, it seemed—and a grand new Orthodox cathedral on Neglinnaya Avenue dedicated to St. Vladimir. Another trolley took her past blocks of solemn gray high-rise apartments where she thought she had lived with Yevgeni. She became confused. Eventually she realized her location and stepped off.


So we see that a vampire tale - its logical, if not unexpected, conclusion, that is - must necessarily describe a transformed society, as well. In this respect a vampire tale must cross over from mere urban fantasy or a paranormal genre into science fiction. Rather than bedazzle readers with the amazing inventions of the future, a vampiric society would, when it had the chance, I believe, return wholeheartedly (no pun intended) to an early age culturally and practically. Yet it is the principal characters we must follow as they function within and attempt to alter the world that we know in 2019.

The Stefan Szekely Trilogy is complete!
(Look to the upper right on this blog for links.)

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(C) Copyright 2010-2019 by Stephen M. Swartz. All Rights Reserved. No part of this blog, whether text or image, may be used without me giving you written permission, except for brief excerpts that are accompanied by a link to this entire blog. Violators shall be written into novels as characters who are killed off. Serious violators shall be identified and dealt with according to the laws of the United States of America.

10 March 2019

How to Write a Medically Accurate Vampire Novel

Spring is not usually the time in which we think of vampires - or the undead in general. However, it is not only October, or specifically the season of Halloween, that brings out our less lively kin. Oh, no. The vampire is a stock character for all seasons, for the vampire is not a seasonal being sent to frighten us on one occasion but to serve as a constant reminder of what can happen to the rebellious, evil abominations who walk among us.
The Stefan Szekely Trilogy is now complete! 
Get Book 3, SUNSET, at an Amazon link near you today! 
(Kindle lovers click here: SUNSET.)

When we think of the vampire, we have many models from literature and cinema to cast in our mind. From legends far and wide comes the idea of someone who has died returning to life or of someone not truly dying but settling into a degree of existence between life and death, what many have termed the undead. It is a frightful situation, indeed, both for the poor sucker [pardon the pun] who must "live" such a "life" as well as for those who may encounter him or her. (Read more information here.)
Back in 2014 I awoke from a nightmare - actually, fell off the darn mare and hit my head on a stone - and I had the idea of writing a vampire tale. Much in the vein of my paranormal-writing colleagues, I sought a story of Gothic pathos, a horror tale of bloody delight! Alas! I could not, however, in good conscience, create something along the lines of more recent vampire fictions. They were too much filled with magic, melodrama, and frou-frou accoutrements than suited my sophisticated tastes. I needed a real vampire.

I knew there were some medical and biological causes of symptoms which are typically associated with those folk claiming vampirism. I did my research, both into legends and customs of Eastern Europe, and into the science behind such awful disorders as porphyria. Is there such a thing as vampirism as a medical condition? And, if so, how does one combat it? Is it genetic or does one catch it from someone who is already a vampire? (One valuable resource was the scholarly book by Paul Barber.)

So I deliberately sought to create a horrific tale as contemporary and realistic as modern science and my twisted imagination could make it. 

The result is the amazing true-to-life story of Stefan, an American of Hungarian ancestry, who is doomed to become a vampire - at precisely the wrong time in his life. Just when Stefan is falling in love with his Beloved, local TV reporter Penny Park, and they are planning to marry, he notices the first sign: A DRY PATCH of SKIN.

“I do care about you,” she whispered.
“Thanks,” I said, trying to sound positive. “We can’t let a dry patch of skin get between us, now can we?”

But I digress...

Check yourself. Check your family members. Look over the people standing close to you. Examine all with whom you come into contact. Look for the tell-tale signs of oncoming vampirism. To aid in your quest for avoidance, here is a handy checklist:
  • dry skin, in blotchy patterns and red-brown shades regardless of natural complexion
  • gaunt features, as though the skin were pulled back tightly against the bones
  • withering away of musculature, rendering the person unusually thin
  • loss of hair, head and body
  • protrusion of teeth as gums shrink
  • protrusion of eyes as sockets decline; loss of lashes and brows
  • semi-hunched posture due to less of muscle and bone integrity
  • heightened senses, especially of olfactory ability (smell)
  • metallic taste in mouth and bitter breath
  • decreased urine and fecal output
  • decreased hunger and thirst sensation
  • exposed skin sensitive to light, especially sunlight; prone to either drying and shredding or to melting
  • hands and feet painful due to swelling; nails may appear to protrude due to reduction of skin borders
  • bearing the scent of decay, mildew, etc. or alternatively a hint of sulfur
  • constant physical readiness for sexual activity
  • capable of periods of sustained activity (3 to 4 days without sleep) followed by prolonged sleep (2-3 days)
  • consumption of heme (blood) improves symptoms temporarily
  • contagious via exchange of bodily fluids
  • no cure, only treatment which offers brief relief at best
  • long-term prognosis: a lengthy, miserable existence filled with alternating nights of desperation and days of coma-like sloth
  • usually a normal life-span (90-120 years), barring attempts at suicide
  • onset usually 30s through 50s; fully symptomatic 2-5 years after onset; transformation complete after 7-10 years
Be aware of those around you who may appear normal yet may have begun the transformation. Take particular note of any strange discolored and/or unusually dry patches of skin upon the face. Avoid those who wish to sample your blood. Call for help should you be unable to extricate yourself from the magnetic aura of a true vampirism sufferer. It is not glamorous; indeed, it is a miserable existence, and in that misery boils an unholy rage, often exploding into violence.

For further information about transforming into a vampire, I recommend reading A DRY PATCH of SKIN.

The truth about being a vampire: It is not cool, not sexy. It’s a painful, miserable existence.

Good reason to avoid that situation, thinks Stefan Székely. He's too busy falling in love with TV reporter Penny Park, anyway. Until one day he has a dry patch of skin on his face.

At first it's annoying, nothing to worry about, some weird skin disease he can treat with lotions. However, as his affliction worsens, Stefan fears that his unsightly problem will ruin his relationship with Penny.

If only that was all Stefan has to worry about! 
He soon realizes there is a lot more at stake than his handsome face. To save himself, Stefan must go in search of a cure for the disease which is literally destroying him inch by inch. If only his parents had told him of his family's legacy.


The next step in creating an accurate vampire trilogy was to
write books 2 and 3.
Keeping it medically accurate proved more challenging. With Book 1, A Dry Patch of Skin, being set in the same year I was writing it, 2013-2014, a sequel needed to be in the future. With only 13 years passing, in Book 2, SUNRISE, it was easier to formulate how much society will have been changed. 
By Book 3, SUNSET, existing even further into the future, I had to stretch myself. This future-creep required a more science-fictionesque approach. Thus, the vampirian aspects seemed to take a backseat to updating the new setting; then I could let my creature play in that setting. However, such a vampirian-led society might choose to return to an older, more stately style more akin to the times of their ancestors and not be so inundated with technological flamboyance. A cultural regression made the re-setting easier, yet I still needed to recount how the world changed back - rather like a clock once a year.

More about the regression next time.


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(C) Copyright 2010-2019 by Stephen M. Swartz. All Rights Reserved. No part of this blog, whether text or image, may be used without me giving you written permission, except for brief excerpts that are accompanied by a link to this entire blog. Violators shall be written into novels as characters who are killed off. Serious violators shall be identified and dealt with according to the laws of the United States of America.

03 March 2019

When SUNSET arrives...

They laughed when I told them I was writing a "vampire" novel. After all, many had done the same previously. And I had already written some science fiction and literary novels. What was my interest in vampires?

I have to admit I was never much interested in the genre. I saw a couple movies made from vampire novels and was not impressed. I tried to see the story behind the vampire curtain. I worked sorta hard to find the interesting drama with the vampire trappings stripped away - because all stories are ultimately about the people in them. In the case of vampire tales, those people have something additional to deal with.

But I happened to know more, mostly from an old news magazine program I once saw on TV, a report on a man who had to cover his skin when he went into the sunlight, whose face had degraded to such an extent he dared not be seen in public, whose affliction was a bad mix of blood and skin diseases. He looked like a vampire. In the program they jokingly referred to his illness as the "vampire disease". Interesting, I thought, but I was not writing about vampires so I put the information away in a drawer of a cabinet in the lower level of my brain - until I needed it.
If you've followed my blog for a while, you know how this started: the Twilight series of movies and books had held my teen daughter hostage! So I swore to explain to her the medical affliction which was real - more real than the glittery skin of a brooding Byronic hero! I recalled that TV program and went to work researching such diseases. I also researched ancient legends from anthropological texts in which such creatures were reported and described. I came to conclusions.

And then I wrote A DRY PATCH OF SKIN, the "first" medically accurate vampire story, set in my own time and place: Oklahoma City, 2013-2014. In fact the story ended in the book in the same week I finished writing the story. That was it: finished. I had addressed the issue. I moved on from my contemporary literary horror opus. But a tragedy has a way of sticking with you. 

I had left my poor hero in such a dire yet lonely situation. I wrote two other novels while being haunted by him. He hated me for how I left him in that situation. I thought I could let it go, forget him; he was merely a fictitious character and he was in a place which suited the story. But not him. Indeed, he vexed me!

So I returned to the tale and gave him a reprieve, let him out of his unbearable situation, let him move on, and wrote SUNRISE, a sequel to the first novel. The setting had to be in the near future, since the first book was set in my own time. That necessitated a bit of science fictioneering, planning how things would be 13 years from the end of the first novel. Letting him out of his casket, however, proved dangerous. Once I started a Book 2, I knew I would need to write a Book 3, as well.

And so, as the sunrise is followed by flesh-burning day, so does SUNSET follow SUNRISE. It is indeed a conclusion, as well as an apotheosis of the form: the vampire imperium, a horrific expansion of the world in Book 2, and, you will be happy to note, I have let our hero out of the casket for good - and evil. Here is a brief description:

It is the night of the Millennial Ball in 2099 and the Black Storm covers all. Stefan Szekely has taken power in Europe, ruling a continent from Budapest, the seat of His empire, with wars in the west and the east to hold the borders. Different blocks of nations compete for limited resources.

The Emperor has little to amuse Him but serving His own lord and master, The Most High, whom he affectionately calls Luce. His mistress urges Him to mingle among the celebratory audience and in that effort comes the assassination attempt!

Repercussions shake the empire. The terror of His reign stokes the citizenry's fury and the palace is mobbed. The Emperor and his staff lock themselves in the imperial suite as palace guards fight the mob. When the attackers finally break into the suite, the Emperor must flee. A secret corridor leads not only to underground salons but to the instigation of a plan long readied, a plan that will save everyone from the fate the Most High has in store for the world - or, if it should fail, the demise of humanity once and for all!

Three interlinked novellas bring the Stefan Szekely Trilogy to an unsettling conclusion.

And so there you have it, the means to an end, a conclusion which concludes everything about the Stefan Szekely saga, a lesson in how the world works under vampire domination - or, perhaps, merely a clever tome of self-indulgent mayhem, a stretching of the finest membranes of imagination to the far reaches of an aging novelist's craft. Indeed, he digresses....



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(C) Copyright 2010-2019 by Stephen M. Swartz. All Rights Reserved. No part of this blog, whether text or image, may be used without me giving you written permission, except for brief excerpts that are accompanied by a link to this entire blog. Violators shall be written into novels as characters who are killed off. Serious violators shall be identified and dealt with according to the laws of the United States of America.