title: Vampire Defanged, The: How the Embodiment of Evil Became a Romantic Hero
author:  Susannah Clements 
description: It's indisputable that vampires are au courant in America, but according to Clements, an associate professor at Regent University, they ain't what they used to be. In this astute survey, she argues that Christian theology, once essential to understanding the vampire, has been lost through decades of change in vampire characterization, effectively de-fanging the vampire of meaningful theological bite. Clements begins with the iconic monster Dracula, a repulsive creature who represented the power of sin and evil in the Christian metanarrative. Moving through such subsequent incarnations as the vampires of Anne Rice, Joss Whedon (in Buffy and Angel), and Charlaine Harris (the Sookie Stackhouse mysteries on which True Blood is based), Clements chronicles a gradual secularization and social acceptance of vampires. By the time Stephenie Meyer stops hearts with Edward Cullen, the vampire is no longer a grotesque cautionary tale of humanity gone wrong but the apotheosis of humanity, a beautiful angel who stands above humankind. Clements writes well and persuasively as she argues that "vampires are more than just monsters to us," demonstrating that now, as ever, the vampire represents our darkest anxieties and most ardent desires. (Mar.) <br />(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
zlib_text: Obsidian Butterfly (v2.0)
  
  Laurell K. Hamilton, 2000
  
    
    
    
  
  Anita Blake, vampire hunter, has dealt with -- and destroyed -- a lot of
  monsters, but her old mentor, Edward, may be worse than any of them. Edward's
  got problems: a malevolent force is mutilating the citizens of Albuquerque. If
  he is to stop it he'll need all of Anita's firepower and cunning.
  
    
    
  
  **Author's Note**
  
    
  
  For those of you who have never read an Anita Blake novel before, let me tell
  you a bit about her world.
  
  It's just like the world we all live in -- except that the creatures of the
  night -- vampires, werewolves, zombies and such -- are not the stuff of
  fiction. They are here-and-now. We co-exist with them -- not always happily,
  not always peacefully.
  
  And sometimes we get to know them all too well ...
  
    
    
    
  
  **1**
  
  ****
  
  I WAS COVERED in blood, but it wasn't mine, so it was okay. Not only was it
  not my blood, but it was all animal blood. If the worst casualties of the
  night were six chickens and a