Guest post written by They Own The Night author Amy McCaw
Amy McCaw is a YA author and prominent figure in the online book community. Her Mina and the Undead trilogy won acclaim for its blend of 90s nostalgia and supernatural thrills. A BookTuber (@yaundermyskin), horror aficionado, and co-curator of A Taste of Darkness, Amy is a passionate advocate for YA fiction.
About They Own The Night: They Own The Night is a high-stakes, adrenaline-laced YA horror from Amy McCaw, the award-winning author of Mina and the Undead. Featuring LGBTQ+ representation, gothic thrills, and echoes of the 1980s AIDS crisis, this is a biting reinvention of Dracula for a new generation.
If you look at the books I write or talk to me for more than thirty seconds, you’ll realise that I love vampires. It started when I discovered Dracula and Interview with the Vampire at way too young an age. And then Buffy the Vampire Slayer came out in my early teens, and that was it. So, these are some of my favourite vampires from different books, movies and TV shows.
Dracula was one of the first vampires I came across, and I was hooked. I find it so interesting that many modern vampires are based on his characteristics, and I think Gary Oldman did an amazing job of portraying him. I’ve always enjoyed getting to know Dracula’s backstory and seeing his powers being revealed as the book goes on. Dracula is my favourite classic, and I love it so much that I wrote my own 1980s retelling, They Own the Night.
Spike is probably my favourite vampire of all time. He’s hilarious and his image is iconic, but I also think his has one of the most developed characters and arcs I’ve ever seen. A lot of the vampires I like tend to walk a line between moral greyness and pure evil, and Spike was the vampire that introduced me to the fun that can be had in the grey area.
Eric is another favourite vampire: first appearing in the Sookie Stackhouse books and then the True Blood TV series. Another fun character, I loved how Eric is introduced as being very mysterious and alluring, and then the books and TV series proceed to peel back his layers and share his history.
Damon is of course from The Vampire Diaries books and TV show. Out of the two Salvatore brothers, I found him the most intriguing. Like several of these listed vampires, he will do anything for love, and you never know if that will be to kiss a love interest or snap another character’s neck. This unpredictability definitely keeps things interesting!
Lestat is one of the first vampires I came across, first in the Interview with the Vampire book and then the movie. He is absolutely unapologetic about what he is, and it’s this sense of pleasure in being a vampire that I really enjoy. Through the Vampire Chronicles books, you get to know him and all of the wild, wonderful and sometimes terrible things he’s done.
Looking back over the list, it seems that unpredictable, morally ambiguous vampires are the ones that pique my interest. This is one of the aspects of vampires that really interest me: will they be the hero or the villain?
