The Bear Bitch's Project: Vampire Love, Second Chances & Disappointments

Unlike most Vampire fanatics right now, I've been a fan of the genre for a

most of my life. It started when I got hooked on a tv show called Forever Knight back in the early 90s but what really got me addicted to Vampires was Interview With a Vampire. I loved the movie and devoured all the books one after the other. My love for vampire books, movies, and tv shows grew from there and I even wrote a thesis on Dracula in college.

I'm not saying that I love all things vampire - there are tons of vampire movies and tv shows out there that I can't stand but I'm definitely willing to give them all a chance - maybe even two.

In the beginning, I only liked traditional vampires; the ones that stuck t

o the established characteristics: i.e. sensual night-dwelling creatures with fangs that sleep in coffins. But after picking up a new and very little known novel called Twilight from the Stanford bookstore back in late 2005, I decided that these new, unconventional vampires had as much appeal, perhaps even more, as the ones already near and dear to my heart. I decided to broaden my horizons and give most, if not all of these newfangled vampires a chance.

More often than not, I've been rewarded by this venturing-out

of sorts. In addition to becoming positively besotted by Twilight (way before the rest of the world, I might add), I also immediately fell in love with Blue Bloods, my other favorite vampire book series (Jack Force is no Edward Cullen but Schuyler Van Allen is 100x better than whinny Bella!), and Moonlight, a tv show that ended way before its time (I ❤ Mick St.John).

While I immediately loved those series, others took a little time and getting used to; one good example of this is the Evernight series. The first book bored me and barely deserved the 3/5 star rating I gave it on my Shelfari account but because it wasn't terrible, I decided to give it a second chance and read the second book in the series. Boy, am I glad I did. The second book was so much better than the first and now I'm actually looking forward to the third.

In light of that, I resolved to be more generous with my second chances.

Soon after the Twilight fever hit, another series quickly hit the bestseller list: L.J. Smith's Vampire Diaries. Copies were flying off the shelf so I was eager to get my hands on copies. Lia was able to get copies as well so she started reading them a couple of days before I did. I had gotten as far as the 6th chapter of the first book when Lia told me that she had struggled and finished the series and it was quite possibly the worst books she had ever read. I agreed that the writing was terrible and she said that the writing was just the beginning: the plot was even worse! Needless to say that I dropped those books like a hot potato.

Over a year later I came upon another book by the same author: Night World 2. I read the back blurb and the stories really interested me - specifically the one about a vampire. I was a bit hesitant to buy the book since Vampire Diaries proved to be such a disaster but I figured that perhaps I didn't give the book enough of a chance. I had only read the first few chapters and this author was, after all, a best-seller so I granted her a second chance.

What a huge mistake!
The writing was just as bad as I remembered it to be but the premise was good enough that I sucked it up and kept going. Just as I was willing to concede that I had possibly wrote the author off a little too early, she slaps me in the face with the most god-awful dialogue ever! Seriously. That had to be the cheesiest, stupidest declaration of love to ever be approved and printed.

After reading that horrid book, I wanted to take the bad taste out of my mouth (so to speak) so I turned to the good ol' reliable television set. As I turned the tv on, I saw that True Blood would be starting in 3 minutes.

Nearly everyone I know is either raving about the Sookie Stackhouse/

Southern Vampire Mysteries books and/or True Blood, the tv series based on the books so I decided to give it a try. Boy am I glad that I only downloaded the free Kindle sample of the first Sookie Stackhouse book (Dead Until Dark) because I did not like it at all. I found that the main character, Sookie, rubbed me the wrong way. She struck me as an odd mix of haughty, naive, and deluded; if she was a real person, I'd be polite to her but I definitely wouldn't spend more time with her than was absolutely necessary.

But again, in the spirit of second chances and all, I decided that it was only fair to give the series, True Blood, an equal and fair chance. I figured that a lot of tv shows that are based on books are actually quite different from the original novel and that having actors interpret characters is a chance for improvement. Besides, the show is such a huge, huge hit that there must be something about it that's worth watching - WRONG AGAIN!

Ugh! I'm sorry, Anna Paquin, but your Sookie is no less annoying than the one in the book. And what's with all the preaching? If I wanted to sit there for an hour and be told about God's saving powers, I'll go to church. I honestly don't see what people are so crazy about. Watching True Blood was like watching Kellie Pickler make out with a vampire who, I'm sorry to say, is so not hot at all! The guy is a 100+ years old and boy does he look it - do you see his eye-bags? Puh-lease!

It totally kills me that True Blood is going strong while an awesome, awesome vampire show like Moonlight was canceled because of that stupid 2008 Writers' Strike.