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I love all things dark and Gothic. But let's face it, the thrill is gone. Paranormal Romance has stolen (or seduced) our Gothic creatures of the night. They've tamed their beastly ways, they've cut their hair, shaved their chests and somehow, managed to hide their fangs. They've taught them to be vegetarian. How to sparkle in the sunlight.
But a tamed beast is no longer a beast. The tension, the angst, is gone -- vanquished. Now that's all well and good in terms of character development. The issue here is that these 'changed' characters are still being portrayed as the fearsome, tortured souls of old. All I see is hairless, fangless, sensitive new-age men, who seem to spend enormous amounts of time thinking about their girlfriends. Girlfriends? Wives? Babies?
I'll fess up now that I have a beast in my Gothic Fantasy series, but I'll state now he's of the flesh eating kind, a real brute. Yes, he will undergo change. How could he not? Just how much grunting and gnashing and devouring can a writer or reader endure before some form of transformation is in order? Meng's no beauty, he's not supposed to be.
Maybe that's the problem I'm having with these emasculated vampires and werewolves, they are beauties now, not beasts. Metrosexual, civilised creatures, one and all.
I mourn the monsters of the past.
But a tamed beast is no longer a beast. The tension, the angst, is gone -- vanquished. Now that's all well and good in terms of character development. The issue here is that these 'changed' characters are still being portrayed as the fearsome, tortured souls of old. All I see is hairless, fangless, sensitive new-age men, who seem to spend enormous amounts of time thinking about their girlfriends. Girlfriends? Wives? Babies?
I'll fess up now that I have a beast in my Gothic Fantasy series, but I'll state now he's of the flesh eating kind, a real brute. Yes, he will undergo change. How could he not? Just how much grunting and gnashing and devouring can a writer or reader endure before some form of transformation is in order? Meng's no beauty, he's not supposed to be.
Maybe that's the problem I'm having with these emasculated vampires and werewolves, they are beauties now, not beasts. Metrosexual, civilised creatures, one and all.
I mourn the monsters of the past.
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