Guest blog with Theresa Milstein - Fangtales

Theresa Milstein, a wonderful blogger, is joining us today to talk about Fangtales. If you aren't already following her blog, you should! Take it away, Theresa!

Thank you for hosting me, Nicole.  You’ve been such a supportive blogging buddy.  Your dedication to writing is an inspiration.

When I asked Nicole if I could do a guest post on her blog, she suggested vampires or what inspired me to write the short story that was accepted in the Fangtales anthology. 

Before I saw the call for submissions for the YA vampire anthology, Fangtales, I’d never written a short story before.  That’s not entirely true.  I’d never written a short story from scratch, from beginning to end.  Before I wrote seriously, I made two miserable attempts.  Once I wrote seriously, I thought I could take the first chapter of a manuscript and turn it into a short story.

I had A LOT to learn.

A few years later, after writing a few more manuscripts, I was a better writer and had a better sense of what it took to write a short story.  I liked the rules for Fangtales:

“The editor (Berni Stevens) of Fangtales prefers traditional vampires as in Bram Stoker's Dracula (this means no walking in the sunlight, eating garlic, or laughing at the sign of the cross...the traditional vampire truly is a creature of the night and not a day-walker with sparkly skin). However, she is looking for a fresh new look at an overworked genre and wants to be scared!”

I liked the idea of using the old rules in a modern setting.   Wyvern Publications had already published Dragontales and Mertales (Nicole is one of the authors in Mertales), so I know the stories can vary widely and are well done. 

But I didn’t know much about vampires.  I had seen the old Dracula movie as a teen.  I read the first two Twilight books and Tantalized.  But I haven’t read any other vampire novels.  There were vampires in Hex Hall and Paranormalcy, but they were one of many paranormal creatures. 

I needed to do some research on Bram Stoker’s Dracula.  The original vampires were shut out from society due the limitations of their vampireness.  I wanted my vampire to have constraints, but live with humans.  And I was happy not to keep my vampires sparkle-free.  I wanted them to be monsters, but to humanize them at the same time. (I know that’s an oxymoronic sentence.)

Who was my vampire?

How did s/he become a vampire? 

What did s/he want?  (Blood is an obvious answer, but I wanted to tap the vein of my character - sorry).

My YA vampire short story is called “Allured”.  Shalom is a new student who has been trying to snag the most popular boy in her high school.  A couple of people in her new town have been murdered, one in a graveyard.  She’s trying to convince this popular boy to visit the graveyard with her. 

That’s all I can say… 

This is how it begins:

 

“I twisted a golden curl in my usual alluring way. Guys loved it when I did that. I lowered my voice, so Reid had to lean in to hear me, his elbows propped on his knees.”

It was fun to write.  I loved having license to be mysterious and scary.  When you read it, I hope you’re scared too. 

Fangtales is available for purchase at Barnes and Noble and Amazon.