Susan Squires Guest Blog and Time for Eternity Giveaway

Fellow Friends of the Fang:

As I can see the approach of Autumn, my thoughts turn to vampires (actually, I think about vampires a lot--but Halloween always seems to give those thoughts a special "bite") I've been into vampires forever. First there was Barnabus Collins as a child (and yay! they are going to put out a remake!) My interest was reinvigorated by Frank Langella in the late 70's. The first book I ever wrote was an historical vampire romance, SACRAMENT. So vamps have been in my soul for quite a while. When I first tried to sell SACRAMENT, several publishers and agents just didn't want to hear about it, because the vampires are the good guys (well, most of them). SACRAMENT was published much later by Dorchester. I used the world I built in SACRAMENT to start a vampire series with St. Martin's Press, beginning with THE COMPANION set in Regency England.

I think what gives vampires such appeal is that they have both paranormal attributes and human problems, too. They have a foot in each world. My vampires have a parasite in their blood which gives them unusual properties, including eternal life and heightened sexuality, along with some pretty big down-side consequences. They are alienated from humanity, victims of boredom and cynicism who have to drink blood to survive and never see the day. If they don't go mad, they are tortured heroes and heroines who have sought meaning in their lives under difficult circumstances. 'So how different are they than we are, really? Some survive their struggle with soul in tact, some don't. One quality all my vampire heroes and heroines have in common is that they can be redeemed by love. One of the most interesting questions out there is how a person continues to believe in the power of love, even after they have learned all the worst about humanity. How do you continue to trust? All my books explore that, one way or another.

That's why I love Charlaine Harris's books--I've been reading them for years. She uses her books to explore big questions of morals and religion and prejudice, though she buries it in a darned good vampire story. And her vamps are characters who struggle with their nature, just like we all do. Then there's the "yum" factor.

Well, I've also always been a time travel fan. So, it shouldn't have surprised me when time travel started sneaking into my vampire books. I had a character I really liked in ONE WITH THE SHADOWS. Publisher's Weekly named that one a Best Book of the Year--really unusual for a romance, let alone a paperback romance. Donnatella was a woman who had lived since the Roman empire as a vampire. She regretted forever not making her one true love, a barbarian slave, vampire too. She watched him age and die. So in ONE WITH THE DARKNESS, I decided to give her a chance to go back and change her life. Of course, it's not as easy as it seems (is anything ever?) Her friend Leonardo daVinci gives her a wonderful machine, and she uses it to try to get what she wants.

I had such fun with that book (and it WASN:T just because of the barbarian slave--though I loved Jergan), I decided to use Leonardo's machine as the center of a series of time travel books. In the first, TIME FOR ETERNITY, out in September, Donnatella gives the machine to Frankie, a vampire bartender in modern day San Francisco, who hates what she is and wants nothing more than to go back to the French Revolution and kill the wicked duke, Henri Foucault, who made her a vampire and abandoned her. But once back in time, she merges into the sweet innocent Francoise she once was, and finds herself falling again for Henri's strange vitality. This time, with Frankie's experience, she begins to realize that Henri had secrets she never suspected. The problem may be to get out of Revolutionary France alive, since the mob is hot on their heels.

So, is time travel ready for a comeback? I hope so. It's been out of favor for a while. And vampires and time travel together? Why not?

Leave a comment telling me what you think about time travel and vampires to be entered for a chance to win one of two copies of Time for Eternity that I am giving away to a couple lucky Fang-tastic Books readers.

Susan Squires
ONE WITH THE DARKNESS, June 2008, St. Martin's Press
DEAD AFTER DARK, anthology, December 2008
TIME FOR ETERNITY, September, 2009, St. Martin's Press


Publishers Weeekly Gave Time for Eternity a Starred Review:


The heroine's dual nature is exquisitely executed, and Squires's lush writing skillfully entwines the dramatic story of an aristocratic smuggler's resistance to corrupt revolution with the romantic tale of lovers drawn together across time. (Sept.)

Publisher’s Weekly, July 20, 2009