Fangtasy Lover

I’m in love. Truly, madly deeply in love. My husband can rest assured that I still love him but he’s also come to accept that sometimes a girl just needs a fantasy guy and boy do I have a fantasy guy. Let me introduce you to Eric Northman:

Eric (Alexander Skarsgard) is a Viking King turned vampire in the True Blood series. Yes that’s right, Northman the Viking and yes he’s a vampire (hey, I never claimed this was sophisticated stuff). You can keep your whining, not to mention celibate, Edward Cullen and the like. I’ve found myself a proper vampire with real bite!

If you haven’t watched True Blood or indeed read the truly appalling Charlaine Harris books, then you’ll have no idea who I’m talking about. I’m sorry for that but seriously, why aren’t you watching? It’s a sexy, gory, very funny show about hot vampires (The books on the other hand, well I’ve already commented on those here)

Of course anyone who knows me well will know that my obsession with the undead started many many years ago. In fact it started long before most of the bloody Twihard fans were even born. When I was just 11 years old I developed the mother of all crushes on this man, Alexander Lucard.

Alexander Lucard ran a global corporation by day and turned into the Prince of Darkness by night. What more could an 11 year old girl want in a crush than international success, billions of pounds, fangs and a cape? Unfortunately this little TV series (rather subtly called ‘Dracula: The Series’) didn’t last too long and I was left to dive into the murky world of vampire literature.

And what murky water it is! There is no lack of reading for anyone interested in vampire tales and mythology but my goodness some of it is truly awful. There are some gems of course but on the whole it’s pretty cringe worthy.

Anyway, back to Eric. Eric didn’t start life as every girls dream. In series 1 of the show he was this tall, gangly drudging fellow. However in series 2 the man positively bloomed and at this stage I’m struggling to watch series 3 without a paramedic standing by. Lets just say the boy got hot!

I would like to able to into a lovely analysis of the appeal of his character but to be fair I’m not that good a writer also, it’s True Blood for goodness sake, how deep can the character be? Instead I’ll leave you with a little taster of the man himself. 

Oh and if vampires aren’t your thing, True Blood has taken that into consideration. It also offers hot shape shifters, wolves and the occasional human.

Dead Awful

Thanks to fabulous show that is True Blood, I have recently started reading the Charlaine Harris series of books that the show is based upon.  Anyone that has watched the show will tell you it's a sexy, irreverent, piece of drama with enough sex, violence & fangs to satisfy any gothic urges you may have.  The books on the other hand . . !  

Well with such snappy titles as Club Dead, Definitely Dead & All Together Dead you can understand why I was a little dubious cracking open the first book (Dead Until Dark in case you were wondering).  I must admit I was pleasantly surprised.  Don't get me wrong, I don't see Charlaine Harris walking off with a Booker prize anytime soon but 'Dead Until Dark' is a perfectly enjoyable bit of fluffy fantasy.  In fact, I was so surprised by how competent the first book was that I got myself the next 4 in the series.  

Oh, what foolish creatures we mortals can be!

The second in the series was readable, barely.  However and about ten pages from the end I had to put it down in shame when this Mills & Boon moment was unleashed from our brooding hero, Vampire Bill:  

'It's lovely, but you may be slightly overdressed for the occasion.'

'What occasion would that be?'

'The best sex of your life.'

Aagggghhhhh! 

 

Why then you ask did I pick up the third book this weekend?  I'm afraid I'm not sure.  Obviously some dark corner of my mind is using this series as a form of self flagellation for some unspoken crime.  Or maybe, just maybe, I'm hoping the books improve.  

That being said I think I'm really done now.  I just can't do it to myself any longer.  I've realised I love myself too much.  Oh and I have Charlaine Harris herself to thank for this revelation.  Nice and early into book 3 Charlaine gave me the push I needed to put the novels down for good.  Thank you Ms Harris.  Oh and in case you're curious, the offending paragraph is below: 

'BIll's Missing,' Pam said, shooting from the conversational hip.

'No, he's not.  He's in Seattle,' I said.  Willfully obtuse.  I had learned that word from my Word-A-Day calendar only that morning, and here I was getting to use it.

Umm yeah, someone might need to have a word with the narrator about what is wrong with this scene!