People often ask what prompted me to step out writing biographical historical fiction and write DRACULA IN LOVE. I have always loved vampires, ever since I watched Dark Shadows on tv as a child. Here’s why:
I Want to be a Vampire (and you should too!)
By Karen Essex
Friends and readers, let me give it to you straight. I do not want to die. It’s that simple. And now that I have written a vampire book, Dracula in Love, and fully explored the advantages, I really, really thirst to be an immortal.... Read more.
I really enjoyed doing this sixty minute radio interview with Jon Hansen. Few interviewers come so well-prepared to discuss a book on so many different levels with an author. Hope you enjoy.
Friends, can it really be true that we’ve had no tv series with a single African-American female lead since 1974??? The article below mentions Teresa Graves’s as an undercover detective in the 1974 made-for-TV flick Get Christie Love!, which I do not remember, but I DO remember watching the beautiful Diahnn Carroll as Julia when I was a kid back in the late ’60s.
So, um, let’s see. Diahnn Carroll broke that glass ceiling, Teresa Graves followed her, and um, we’ve had a mere 40 year absence of series led by a single black woman??
Where have I been that I didn’t notice this disparity? Me, the lifelong feminist writer and (I hope) someone who lives without racial prejudice of any kind. Well, I guess I’ve been living where I’ve always lived, on PLANET WHITE! Apparently, everyone who runs network tv also resides there.
Thanks to the wonderful Shonda Rhimes, who created both Gray’s Anatomy and The Practice, we will once again have a network series fashioned around an independent, intelligent, interesting woman of color.
Check out the article and look for SCANDAL,an upcoming and LONG OVERDUE series inspired by the life of Judy Smith, a real-life political clean-up woman.
I am the guest blogger today at the superb site “Wonders & Marvels: A community for curious minds who love history, its odd stories, and good reads.” That’s us, right? The post is about my research into Victorian insane asylums and female hysteria for DRACULA IN LOVE.
THE SITE IS ALSO HOSTING A 5 COPY GIVEAWAY OF DRACULA IN LOVE!
I originally wrote this piece for Publisher’s Weekly but it was cut in half for space. Here is the unedited version.
No Sex, Please, We’re Literary!
Sex sells. But what about sexy storylines? When it comes to fiction is sex in one category and literature in another, and never the twain shall meet? In this provocative essay, author Karen Essex takes on the issue and responds to critics of her literary thrillerDracula in Love. So get ready … things are about to heat up.
During an auction for the audio rights to my new novel, Dracula in Love, my editor forwarded me an email that was sent from one of the bidders. “This book is so hot that I can’t wait to get home to my wife!” he proclaimed, and then outbid everyone else and presumably went home and made his wife happy. (Mrs. Audio Rights, you owe me.)... Read more.
