Crowds pack Munci for "True Blood" author

Hundreds of fans with books in their hands and vampires on the brain lined the Municipal Auditorium on Saturday, eager to get a signature and brief moment with Charlaine Harris, author of the Sookie Stackhouse series recently turned into HBO's "True Blood."Charlaine Harris among Southern writers at Author! Author! event

"We're just thrilled with the response," said Lynn Laird, committee chair of the Author! Author! Shreveport-Bossier Book Festival, which hosted the book signing. "Thanks to authors like Charlaine, it's just been an awesome event."

Harris' series, also known as the Southern vampire series, was turned into an HBO show by "Six Feet Under" creator Alan Ball. The story is set in Bon Temps, a fictional northern Louisiana town near Shreveport, and a minor portion of the first season was filmed locally.

Sookie is a telepathic barmaid who falls in love with a vampire named Bill Compton, with a relationship on the brink of two worlds: one of mundane rural Louisiana drenched in sweat, fear and superstition, and the other of mysterious bloodsuckers torn between ancient tradition and mainstream assimilation.

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