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This is Part 1
others can be found here
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Sookie enlivens 'Dead to the World'
Read the review and then read the book again to get ready for True Blood season 4
BOOK REVIEW
Try delving deeper into the supernatural world, and you'll uncover the completely natural, pretending. In Dead to the World, the fourth novel in the Sookie Stackhouse Series, author Charlaine Harris throws witches into the fray. The completely human dabblers in the supernatural create mayhem in Sookie's life, challenging her to move forward with her innermost desires while fighting her foes.
Book four begins with a teaser about something Sookie relished in the past, her relationship with Bill, who makes a valiant attempt to explain the vampire world to Sookie by telling her he got with his old girlfriend, Lorena, who turned Bill into a vampire. She ordered him to leave Sookie, and he had to respond to the blood tie when she called. Sookie is feisty and refuses to listen to his platitudes. Bill adds further injury by telling her that he's leaving for a while on the queen's orders to go to Peru. Bill leaves her in danger of attack.
read on
read on
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Denis O’Hare Sinks His Teeth Into Debate on True Blood vs. Broadway Fans
After a sensationally over the top run on season three of HBO’s uber-popular vampire series True Blood, Tony winner Denis O’Hare (who played the show’s murderous King of Mississippi) has found a new set of admirers on his way back to the stage in the forthcoming Broadway production of Elling. So, which fans are more hard-core: Broadway-goers or vampire lovers? “It’s a tossup,” O’Hare recently told Broadway.com. “Broadway fans have to travel here to see their shows, so they have a level of commitment that’s more than just tuning in every week.” Thanks to TV, however, O'Hare can feel his profile rising: “I get left alone for the most part, but then suddenly somebody will scream, ‘Oh my God! You’re the King of Mississippi!'”
O’Hare got a taste of True Blood fandom at San Diego’s Comic-Con convention earlier this year. “Comic-Con is a special kind of crazy,” the actor joked. “There were around 130,000 people there!” In addition to convention-goers, the actor was surprised to find he had intergalactic fans. “I got surrounded by the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation,” he exclaimed. “First Deanna Troi [Marina Sirtis] walked up, then Data [Brent Spiner], then Worf [Michael Dorn]. I was just like ‘Oh my God!’” But after his character's questionable fate of being encased in a tomb of concrete for the next 100 years, will O’Hare be back for season four? “I love the show and really hope I’m back next year," he said. "It's a very good atmosphere."
read on
Cory Feldman returns to vampire franchise
Mention the Twilight series to Corey Feldman and he’ll feign ignorance. “Never heard of it,” he says, brow furrowed under shaggy black hair. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Is that a comic book or a kids’ cartoon?” Then the laugh comes. “Just joking.”
With his own new vampire movie coming out, Lost Boys: the Thirst, Feldman recognizes the importance of that other bloodsucking franchise.
“What I say is let them keep making movies because it’s keeping us in business,” he says. “The more romance novelists there are out there making romanticized ideas of vampirism for the kids, the more people want to see a real action movie putting the bad guys where they belong.”
read on
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Kevin Jackson's top 10 vampire novels Part 4
8. The Moth Diaries by Rachel Klein
A sophisticated exercise in unreliable narration: the novel purports to be a memoir written some 30 years after the event by a former psychiatric patient who witnessed some terrible events at the exclusive girls school she attended. But, somewhat in the manner of Henry James's classic ghost story "The Turn of the Screw", the reader gradually comes to wonder whether the true villain of the piece might not be the supposed girl-vampire who broods all day in her dorm room but the narrator herself. There are hopeful rumours of a forthcoming film version, to be directed by Mary Harron; fingers crossed.9. Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist
No one who has seen the justly acclaimed film version of Lindqvist's bleak but unexpectedly humane novel will need much encouragement to seek out the original, where much that is cryptic about the on-screen story becomes clarified. The heart of the narrative remains the same – a story of friendship and love between Oskar – a lonely, sad, bullied boy – and Eli, the girl (or is she?) vampire who comes to be his protector. But the book encompasses other tales too, and makes explicit the fact that Eli's older male companion is in fact a paedophile as well as a killer. Harsh, and uncomfortable, but compelling.10. Dracula by Bram Stoker
The daddy of them all; by no means the best-written (Stoker was, at best, a competent prose stylist, and none of his other fictions have stood the test of a century) nor the cleverest, not even the most original ... but none the less a masterpiece of myth-making, comparable only to the works of Mary Shelley and Conan Doyle. It has been said that all western philosophy is a series of footnotes to Plato; it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that all modern vampire fiction is haunted by Dracula. If you haven't read it, a bloody treat lies ahead.Alexander Skargard says the controversial Rolling Stone cover"just happened on the day"
Most celebrity photo shoots take weeks of planning, but that controversial Rolling Stone cover featuring a nude and bloodied trio of "True Blood" stars? It "just happened on the day" - or so claims Alexander Skarsgård in a new interview with GQ UK.
"We showed up and we shot very PG-13 with our clothes on for basically the whole day, like six or seven hours," says Skarsgård, who posed alongside co-stars Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer. "Then towards the end the photographer said, 'I have this, these shots are beautiful and the magazine is going to be happy with them, but I'd like to try something if you guys are game.'"
After the photographer explained his concept, Skarsgård says, "It was just one of those things in the moment where we all looked at each other, we'd spent all day with the photographer, we felt comfortable with him, we knew that he was great and the atmosphere was right, and we were like, '[Expletive] it, let's do it.'"
The actor admits that no one thought Rolling Stone would actually run the gutsy photo. "They want to sell at Walmart," he explains. "We thought this was going to be too offensive."
Charlaine Harris : Sink your teeth into hit series
...But that has all changed with the success of the Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries (better known by the TV title True Blood) which have sold several million copies, including 400,000 in Australia in the past year.
Harris is no longer a solo operator -- she has a business team behind her. She has an assistant to orchestrate store appearances and publicity requests; a continuity editor; a group of friends who read her first draft; and a tribe of dedicated fans who have volunteered to run her websites and supply fan information and apparel.
"Things have changed a lot," Harris says. "Certainly people are definitely wanting more things from me. I'm getting used to having a new reality.
"It's very gratifying for any writer to be taken so seriously. There are times it is exasperating, but it's also what we all aim for when we start our careers -- the success of knowing people love what we have done. It's very exciting. It's also a tremendous responsibility."
Harris, a writing veteran of more than 20 years, says her first two series were conventional murder mysteries, but with her Sookie Stackhouse books she wanted to write a series "which would stand out".
"I began to think I could do better and write something different. Something I was trying to convey was not getting across, so with the Sookie books I expressed my sense of humour . . . I had lots of blood and explicit sex.
"It came at the right time, the right blend of characters. The books hit a nerve. They started to sell through word of mouth.
"Your books have to have a spark in them. You have got to make the reader love your characters and be vitally interested in what happens next."
Harris says one of the main reasons she was attracted to writing a series was to "establish new and different ways to stay true to my characters".
She has just finished the 11th book in the proposed 14-book series Dead Reckoning (out next May).
Harris says she likes to create characters who are strong but also sympathetic with secret pasts.
"People want to follow the characters through their lives, much the same way as a series on television.
"The readers develop strong opinions about what should happen to them and what direction the series should take," Harris says.
read on
True Mud : more on the " Bill Compton Muppet "
There is much discussion on the Muppet wiki ( of course , there is a Muppet wiki! did you think we were the only ones that obsessed on a TV show ? ) about the True Blood ( Mud ) Parody
A Bill Compton Muppet appears in a Sesame Street sketch, "True Mud", a parody of the series True Blood. He's a caricature of series lead Bill Compton (played by Stephen Moyer).The man strolls into a restaurant (whooshing through the room instead of walking) and orders some "true mud." The rest of the patrons accuse him of being a Grouch, as they have a strong affinity for mud. However, the waitress brings him a "true spud", some "true cud" and a man name Bud, who tries giving him his broken watch (a "true dud"). Annoyed, the man throws himself on the floor, with a "true thud". Just when he's had enough, the waitress finally brings in a bathtub full of mud, which he uses for his mud bath.
"Vampires Don't Sleep Alone " Your Guide to Meeting, Dating and Seducing a Vampire
"Vampires Don't Sleep Alone " is a tongue-in-cheek guide to meeting, dating and seducing a vampire in today's modern society. It is the creation of the Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab's very own Elizabeth Barrial and DH Altair. In it, they describe 10 types of vampires to help you decide not only if you should romance a vampire, but if so, which kind. We need more than just our imagination though, so of course, BPAL had to create a line of scents to personify each of these vampires. In this roundtable, Tarts describe how the scents smell to them and how they fit that vampiric image.
UNLEASH YOUR DARKEST DESIRES
Passionate and dangerous, the vampire is the ultimate lover. Stalking his prey in the dark of night, he is not easily tamed. But armed with the right skills for seducing a sexy immortal, you can meet, date and ultimately sleep with the vampire of your dreams. Vampires Don't Sleep Alone provides the vital information you need to take a walk on the dark side and delve into the pulse-pounding world of vampire love and lust, including:
Passionate and dangerous, the vampire is the ultimate lover. Stalking his prey in the dark of night, he is not easily tamed. But armed with the right skills for seducing a sexy immortal, you can meet, date and ultimately sleep with the vampire of your dreams. Vampires Don't Sleep Alone provides the vital information you need to take a walk on the dark side and delve into the pulse-pounding world of vampire love and lust, including:
- How to turn on your vampire without arousing his hunger for blood
- Different types of vampires and which one is right for you
- How to keep your sex life exciting for eternity
About the Author
D.H. Altair is the vampire nom de plume of Del Howison, a three-time nominated Bram Stoker Award winning editor and author. He has been nominated for a Shirley Jackson Award, a Rondo Hatton Award, and the Black Quill Award. His own short stories have appeared in various anthologies throughout the years and his tale "The Lost Herd" was converted into a script by Mick Garris and filmed as the premiere episode of the NBC horror anthology series "Fear Itself". Elizabeth Barrial is a freelance writer and the co-owner of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, the world's first dark perfume house, whose thematic focus is literature and gothic cultural anthropology.Sunday, October 3, 2010
HBO's True Blood Wins AdvertisingAward -MIXX Best in Show
Last night, the Interactive Advertising Bureau held its sixth annual MIXX Awards to "recognize the brand marketers and agencies responsible for the most innovative and effective interactive advertising of the year."
This year, Best in Show went to HBO's True Blood and Digital Kitchen for their "Hacking Reality" campaign for the second season launch of the vampire series. The work integrated digital and traditional media, with online, outdoor, print, stunts and a series of brand partnerships.
The second season of True Blood was teased through a mix of media tactics including vampires in faux blogs and online editorials as well as in traditional advertising and editorial takeovers. The strategy included co-branding with products like Geico, Harley-Davidson and Gillette, a host of classified ads, viral videos and a serialized weekly Inside Edition-type show covering all things vampire.
The worked seemed to have paid off since it resulted in True Blood season 2, episode 1, being the most-watched show on HBO On Demand, with an average of 12.6 million gross viewers per episode for the season, up 62% over the previous year.
The Complete List of 2010 MIXX Award Winners:
Best in Show
HBO's True Blood & Digital Kitchen for "Hacking Reality"
more
Good at being bad Weasel bureaucrat at the heart of “The Event” has perfected the art of being sinister
True Blood behind the scenes Kevin Jackson's top 10 vampire novels Part 3
5. Salem's Lot by Stephen King
Stephen King's only major venture into vampire territory, and a masterpiece of its kind. Dickens might not have enjoyed the subject matter, but he would have nodded with a professional's recognition at King's basic ploy as a story-teller: spend a couple of hundred pages slowly and carefully building up a powerful sense of a real community, with lightning sketches of everyone from schoolchildren to elderly drunks ... and then unleash pure evil. The chapter in which the vampire contagion finally reaches what would now be called the Tipping Point is brilliantly terrifying; on the strength of that passage alone, King would qualify as one of the grand masters of horror fiction.6. Suckers
by Anne Billson
This debut novel by Anne Billson, a noted film critic and frequent contributor to the Guardian, was highly praised by Salman Rushdie and others as a sharp and witty satire on the greedy 1980s. And so it was, but that was only part of the story: it is also a gripping adventure yarn, a tale of the nemesis that may lie in store for us if we have ever committed a guilty act, and a delicious character study of an unconventional young woman whose weaknesses (envy, malice, jealousy) only make her all the more charming to the reader. It contains one of the most chilling moments in all vampire literature: the heroine, trying to pass as a vamp in a crowd of keen-nosed killers, realises that she has begun to menstruate ...7. Anno Dracula by Kim Newman
Kim Newman's series of novels about an alternative universe in which vampires are the aristocrats, politicians, power brokers and opinion-formers of the modern world is a delicious mixture of wild invention, scholarship, lateral thinking and sly jokes. In the first volume, Anno Dracula, we find out just why the Count came to England – something that Bram Stoker was tight-lipped about: he married Queen Victoria and established a dynasty of Nosferatu. Subsequent volumes include The Bloody Red Baron, in which the vampires of Britain wage ferocious air war against their German counterparts, and Dracula Cha Cha Cha, set in Rome at the time when Fellini is shooting La Dolce Vita. (One of the characters is a Scottish secret agent: Bond; Hamish Bond ...) Unmissable.
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