Question by Lis: How Can I make my (vampire) story more appealing?
I don’t want it to be another typical vampire story. Would anyone have any suggestions? How does it sound so far in terms of understanding what the story is about? Thanks 🙂
ARSENI:
I am, as you will discover, flesh and blood, but not human. I haven’t been human for three hundred years. That morning I was not a vampire for the very first time of my existence. For the first time, I set out to become what I became.
I walked all night, I walked as I had walked years and years before, when my mind was swarmed with the guilt of killing. I had thought of all the things I had done, and couldn’t undo. And I longed for a moment’s peace. Whatever happened to me, I do not know. Yet I go on, night after night, as it was. I no longer feed on those who cross my path. But all my passion goes, and still is, with her.
So it was, when I’d given up the search for humans, that a human found me. For thirty years I had avoided that place. Yet I found my way back there with hardly an upward glance. Oh, how she was a gilded beautiful youth. Her eyes alone told the story of her age, staring out from under her doll-like curls, with a questioning that will one day need an answer.
There we were, we kept to ourselves, pondering the mysteries of each other. I stood on that deck, and I watched her whole magnificence as if it were my first. It was in the spring of 1899 in New York, and as soon I smelled the air, I knew I was home. She was rich, like the scent of jasmine and roses around our old courtyard. And after a while, as we both said our farewells, I walked the streets, savouring that long lost perfume.
That very morning, as I returned, I returned with a hunger I had never felt. Blood, to me, is a necessity. Companionship, I was to find, was a necessity as well. I watched her dine on heavy plates and drink from heavy glasses, mortals at her side, as is she. We are predators, whose all seeing eyes we are meant to give them detachment.
Out of curiosity, boredom, lust, who knows what, I left that old world behind, and came into hers. And there, a mechanical wonder allowed me to repent for the first time in a hundred years. And what repentance, as seen from the human eye, seemed to spread through me like a fire. Like a monster, to destroy us both.
I remember it completely, yet I cannot recall a feeling quite like it. Her, with her gilded beautiful youth, she comforts me for days, weeks, months, with my corruption of an eternity. As she rested, I set out and saw the last of my sunrise, prowling the night, feasting on whores and town maids, yet the blood of hers was what truly thrilled me best.
I stood in that courtyard, fearful she would come out into the night, revealed of what I truly was. And all the while, I thought, ‘Arseni, you deserve her vengeance. You have given her a dark gift, surrendered yourself into the very hands of God’s child. She has delivered you love, and a warm bed. An angel, oh my sweet, warm youth.’
And as I return, drained of death and hunger, there lays my warm angel, in tones of red, and yellow, and my long lost blue. She dreams of centuries long after this world, and why has she gone where I cannot follow? Oh, why is love, or any other human emotion like it, intensified by absence?
Best answer:
Answer by Gus
You can’t! Vampires suck.
Give your answer to this question below!
Garr,
You mention not wanting your work to sound like anything else, but I’m afraid it sounds alot like the beginning of Interview with the Vampire, where Louis narrates the beginning and parts of the rest of the story.
I never liked the words ‘not human’ for vampires. They are human, with the exception that they’re immortal humans. In some books and movies they mention ‘humans’ are our prey. This I don’t care for either. I would rather them refer to us as ‘mortals.’
Your story sounds interesting, but not unique. I believe this is why Twilight became so popular. It involved teens as both vampire and mortals. This gave it the difference that was needed.
PJ M
i think its pretty good. i don’t quite get how he became a vampire. sometimes it sounds like he was born a vampire or something, and other times it sounds like he sought out a vampire to make him immortal, and other times it sounds like his life was stolen from him. and sometimes i couldn’t tell if the girl was human or vampire; i figured out by the end that she’s human, but there are parts like: “we are predators, whose all seeing eyes we are meant to give them detachment”–i thought the “we” refered to arseni and the girl on first reading it, but then i realized that arseni was refering to all vampires when he says “we.” I think maybe just a little bit more clarity in your story and a little brushing up on your grammar (there are some run on sentences with commas in the wrong place) will make this a much better story. i know this isn’t that actual story and its more like an explanation so obviously your story would be a lot more detailed than this lol, and from what i read it sounds really good and really interesting. i would definitely read this if you get it published. its seems really classical with the questing vampire fighting his dark, powerful nature and then the angelic young girl. i don’t really know what you could do to make it more appealing. i like the little bit of dialogue you have in the second to last paragraph. your dialogue sounds really romantically influenced and old-fashioned in a good way. the only things i can say are make sure that you have an entire vampire world/way of life set up so that your vampires don’t just sit around and scare humans because they have nothing else to do, like a world of the damned, so that when your vampire says he left that old world behind, there is an actual savage way of life he left behind. also, just add a lot of imagery and detail in your writing, kind of like anne rice. she really set up the scenes for her vampires to walk in, and for a story like this, i think strong imagery will make it more appealing. and also know the era/ time you’re writing in, which i think is 1899. make sure you understand it so that it doesn’t sound like you just decided that 1899 was a romantic, convinient year to write a quickie vampire romance or something (not that thats what your story sounds like at all). good luck!