Basic "Facts" About Vampires

Discuss the December 2016 Book of the Month, Nightlord by Garon Whited.
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Re: Basic "Facts" About Vampires

Post by cyndibookswagbag »

There are so many vampire legions in books and movies now, even sparking!
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Post by MrsCatInTheHat »

I think of strategies to ward off vampires: garlic, signs of the cross. And I think of neck biting. The last vampire movie I watched was decades ago. I think it was called Lost Boys.
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Post by Sarah_Khan »

Great topic! It's fun to read some of these facts that I never heard of before. I think the great part about vampire stories is that each author can make up his/her own rules as to what a vampire really is. Some authors stick to the classic way of things and others make up their own modern vampire rules, either way it's still fun to read. :)
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Post by CzechTigg »

I like the idea of beheading a vampire, and how it collapses into ashes rather than leaving a grisly 2-bit corpse. (A bit underused on Buffy the TV show).
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Post by Julie Ditton »

I enjoyed the fact that the author touched on most of these "facts" and reworked them. I especially liked the mind control reworked into the nonfatal energy siphoning and the fact that Halar did not believe in mind control per se. The garlic aversion is the only popular myth that I think he didn't touch.
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Post by Wasif Ahmed »

gali wrote:There are many legends about vampires. I like the fresh take on vampires here. One known "fact" about Vampires is that they burn in daylight. Eric only suffers some ill effect through Sunset and Sunrise, but can be exposed to daylight otherwise. What do you know about vampires and how does it apply here?
Well....this is just about all I know about vampires, that they burn in daylight. :D
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Post by Ellie Gatillo »

Gravy wrote:Mind control. It's rare to find a vampire mythology where they don't have some sort of psychic talent, usually for subduing humans.
I've heard of this. From where I come from, it is said that making eye contact with a vampire would make you a vampire's slave. Something like being hypnotized to do their bidding.
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Post by David Nash »

I'm surprised no one has mentioned being unable to look in a mirror and that they have no reflection if someone else looks at them in a mirror. They have the ability to summon rats, bats and wolves. Dogs howl in their presence and slink or run away. Cats will hiss if confronting them directly. In some stories they can change into bats or wolves or both. Birds flee wherever they are sleeping at sundown and usually crows and ravens like to flock near their resting places during the daytime. Songbirds do not go near their resting places.
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Post by Thimble »

There are a lot of "facts" because vampires are fictional and writers use what they want. One that I have only seen in one book is that vampires have to count things. They're supposed to be OCD about counting objects. I've seen this in a few movies, though.
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Post by Julie Ditton »

Well said David. You caught a lot of the myths that the rest of us missed. I read and watched those older stories and should have remembered those "facts", especially the mirror!
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Post by cvega93 »

From what I've read so far, which is only about one third of the book, I can definitely say that the typical vampire facts come into play. (IE. No sunlight, blood, strength, etc.) I'll update this more as I get into the book, and see if I can add anything more to the other parts of vampire myths I've came across over the years.
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Post by kandscreeley »

The so-called "facts" about vampires change every time a new story is written. In just about every story, vampires are made and not born. Humans have to go through some kind of change in order to become a vampire. Vampires are almost always superhuman in some type of way whether it be super-strength or super-speed. They are almost always hard to kill. There is always a need for blood. The "myth" about sunshine varies from story to story.
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Post by Kourtney Bradley »

Gravy wrote:I can't say how it applies to the book, but one of the original vampire "facts" was that they had to keep dirt from their homeland, to sleep in. That also brings to mind the whole coffin thing, which obviously does not apply here; that much I know from the sample :lol:

Also, the stake through the heart.

I look forward to reading more of this thread :D
I've never heard this one, about the dirt from their homeland. Pretty interesting!
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Post by Sindhu Srinath »

I don't actually believe in such stuff, but if they do exist, I like to think of the nice ways, such as portrayed in the Twilight series. It feels good to think of vampires as friendly immortals.
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Post by mewsmash »

In most vampire mythology, they not only live eternally, but maintain the age they were bitten at forever. Awesome for people in their peaks of life, but not exactly fun to be a kid vampire who can't do anything.
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