When we set out to create our Regency paranormal world, we were taxed with the job of deciding who would populate our world. In the beginning, we had a very normal (human) heroine, Lily. That’s our first book, A Certain Wolfish Charm. So, okay, we have humans in our world, we know that. Now what else do we have? Regency rakes already had a lot in common with the Lycans we had in mind, so that was a nice fit. They were privileged, growly men who usually were scoundrels by their very nature. So, our Regency Lycans were born. We decided that only our males could be Lycans, though females can pass on the Lycan trait and they also wear the same birthmark as a Lycan male. But only the Lycan males are driven by the power of the moon.
Then in our second book, one of our Lycans got a little broken. Who better to heal him than a Scottish witch? Our course, our Regency Lycans had no idea Scottish witches existed. And neither did we, until we sent Benjamin Westfield off to find a hook-nosed old woman who could heal everything that ailed him in Tall, Dark and Wolfish. Little did we know that beautiful Elspeth Campbell had replaced her mother as healer in a coven of five. Honestly, we had no idea until the coven sisters walked into the pages with their various talents, charms, and powers. And attitudes. Lots of attitude.
So, now we have a world populated with the average, everyday human, Lycans and Scottish witches. Our third book was a girl-next-door romance, where William Westfield finally has to atone for all of his sins before he can get anywhere with the woman he has loved from afar – way afar because she hates him. Way, way afar. But again, this book, The Wolf Next Door, was Lycans, a human lady and a little Scottish witch thrown in for some humor.
But at the end of this book, we had a side heroine everyone hated. Literally hated. In reviews, people even mentioned this side character as being spoiled and hateful. And we had the bad guy from The Wolf Next Door, Dashiel Thorpe, who was a Lycan and he needed so badly to be redeemed. So, spoiled little witch meets bad boy Lycan in The Taming of the Wolf. We didn’t plan this book ahead of time. It just happened.
But sparks don’t begin to fly until our fifth book, when a witch with said sparks beneath her fingertips encounters a man who has been locked in the dungeon of her family’s castle. He has been asleep for twenty years, she soon learns. But he’s more than two hundred and fifty years old. Onto our stage and into our Regency paranormal world walks our very first vampyre, the hero of It Happened one Bite. But he’s not alone. When he wakes, more than one vampyre come calling.
By this point, we have Lycans, witches and vampyres in our world. Vampyres seemed to be a fairly natural introduction, and indeed they bring a bit of history with them that’s a lot of fun to explore. James was saved from death and introduced to a life-after-death by a vampyre who we met in The Taming of the Wolf, although we’re not sure how many readers caught the reference. Lord Blodswell is a former knight in shining armor. And he began the circle of three vampyres who walk onto our pages and into our hearts. The third, vampyre, well, he’ll just have to remain a mystery at this point. But it’s someone we all know and love, who is changed when he chooses life-after-death over death.
Our Regency vampyres are gentlemen in their own rights, and are in fact so gentlemanly that they would never bite the neck of a woman to whom they have not been introduced. It’s tough being a vampyre and a gentleman, or so we hear. We’re eager to hear how much you like these new additions to our world. And hope you enjoy them as much as we did.
Here’s a question for you – what’s your favorite addition to the paranormal world? Dragons? Vamps? Lycans? Werecats? Or something else entirely?
IT HAPPENED ONE BITE BY LYDIA DARE – IN STORES MARCH 2011He’s Lost, Trapped, Doomed for All Eternity… Rich, titled and undead, gentleman vampire James Maitland, Lord Kettering, fears himself doomed to a cold and lonely existence—trapped for decades in an abandoned castle. Then, beautiful Scottish witch Blaire Lindsay arrives, and things begin to heat up considerably…
Unless He can Persuade Her to Set Him Free… Feisty Blaire Lindsay laughs off the local gossip surrounding her mother’s ancestral home—stories of haunting cannot scare off this battle-born witch. But when she discovers the handsome prisoner in the bowels of the castle, Blaire has no idea that she has unleashed anything more than a man who sets her heart on fire…
The Dare Duo- Tammy and Jodie
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lydia Dare is the writing team of Tammy Falkner and Jodie Pearson. Both Tammy and Jodie are active members of the Heart of Carolina Romance Writers and live near Raleigh, North Carolina. Their next two books will also feature gentleman vampires: In the Heat of the Bite (July 2011) and Never Been Bit (September 2011)! For more information, please visit http://www.lydiadare.com/ .
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