Today author Michele Drier interviews Jean-Louis, a 500-year-old Hungarian vampire.
Interview With A Vampire by Michele Drier
Jean-Louis is a five hundred year old vampire and today I’m talking to him about the past, the future and (ahem) his love life.
Photo Copyright: prometeus, via Bigstock.com
MD: First, let’s get the name out of the way. You just go by Jean-Louis. Do you have a last name?
J-L: I did. I was born Jean-Louis Lemend. I was, hmm…thirty-three when Stefan turned me. It’s just been easier for all of us to use Kandesky if we need a last name. We seldom do, though.
MD: Stefan turned you? Is that the Baron Kandesky?
J-L: Yes. He’d been a vampire for about a hundred and fifty years when I went to work for him. He needed a regular to handle all the affairs for his expanding trading business. He was still killing for most of his food and didn’t trust himself away from his home base.
MD: Were you happy when you were turned?
J-L: Oh lord no! I was appalled when Stefan did it. He had to keep me tied to the bed and almost unconscious for weeks until my body adapted to living off blood. And when I faced the inevitable, I insisted we stop killing for food.
MD: Stopped killing? Do you mean you don’t any more?
J-L: We haven’t killed for food for hundreds of years! We use donors and people are happy to donate to us when they feel the rush for the first time. Maxie claims it’s the closest thing to an orgasm. We also use animal blood and today don’t have any shortages. It allows us to give dinner parties with regulars…they have a five course meal; we have borscht, steak tartare and blood pudding.
MD: Ah, Maxie! Is she first woman you loved?
J-L: No, but she’ll be the last (laughs). I was married once before for more than a century. Her name was Magda and when she was killed I swore I’d never marry again.
MD: It sounds as though you haven’t been involved with many women.
J-L: Oh, I have. With a lot. My problem is that I’m attracted to regulars. They’re new and fresh and their skin is so soft and creamy. But none of them have been permanent. I never cared enough for any to turn them and live with them for eternity. And if I didn’t turn them, they’d get old. I didn’t want to stick around and watch them die. I know that family members, particularly the women, were tired of my choosing regulars then dumping them. Most of those women never met the family…and a lot of them wanted to meet Stefan.
MD: Why Stefan?
J-L: Because he’s the Baron Stefan Kandesky and, on paper, owns SNAP. You know, the international celebrity gossip conglomerate? They’d all love to get a centerpiece spread in the magazine or five minutes on the TV shows.
MD: Don’t you work for SNAP?
J-L: As far as much of the public knows, I’m the art director. I’m the second-in-command of the family, oversee all of our businesses and Stefan is the public face. We do that because he’s established a reputation as a reclusive European Baron living quietly in his castle in Hungary.
MD: Out of all the times you’ve lived through, what’s been your favorite?
J-L: Ahhh, I enjoyed the eighteenth century. Our business was growing, I was traveling over much of Europe and the Middle East, there was an explosion of art and music happening, we’d reached a truce with our enemies the Huszars, and of course I’d met Magda. I have to honestly say, though I’m embracing the current. I love all the technology, the instant information, the travel. We’ve built our wealth—I tease Maxie that she loves me because I have centuries of experience with women and am richer than Bill Gates. She threatens to retaliate by finding a portrait of me in satin knee breeches. Hah, I had the demons burn all of them!
MD: What’s next?
J-L: Expanding the reach of SNAP, broadening our coverage beyond just celebrity gossip, loving and living with Maxie for eternity. She’s contemporary and I believe she’s so bright and so curious that she’ll always be finding challenging new things for us. We have the ages to explore together.
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Editor’s Note: You can read Jean-Louis’ story in the two novellas, Plague: A Love Story and Danube: A Tale of Murder. Maxie and Jean-Louis’ story is being told in the SNAP novels. Number nine, SNAP: I, Vampire will be available in early 2015.
Blurb for SNAP: All That Jazz
Nik and Jazz, both employees of Kandesky Enterprises and passionate lovers, are having a tumultuous time. Are their differences too great? She’s a contemporary, hip, young career woman working in the fast-changing world of celebrity gossip journalism in Los Angeles. He’s a 500-year old vampire living in Kiev, Ukraine and running the Kandesky Munitions factories. She deals with celebs and sun, he deals with terrorists and dark.
Is their overpowering attraction enough to build a life-long future, or will their relationship fizzle out before Maxie’s and Jean-Louis’ wedding, dying faster than a Fourth of July sparkler?
Michele Drier was born in Santa Cruz and is a fifth generation Californian. She’s lived and worked all over the state, calling both Southern and Northern California home. During her career in journalism—as a reporter and editor at daily newspapers—she won awards for producing investigative series.
SNAP: All That Jazz, Book Eight of The Kandesky Vampire Chronicles, was published June 30, 2014. The Kandesky Vampire Chronicles paranormal romance series include SNAP: The World Unfolds, SNAP: New Talent, Plague: A Love Story, DANUBE: A Tale of Murder, SNAP: Love for Blood, SNAP: Happily Ever After?, SNAP: White Night and SNAP: All That Jazz. SNAP: I, Vampire, Book Ten in the Kandesky Vampire Chronicles is scheduled for publication early 2015. She also writes the Amy Hobbes Newspaper mysteries, Edited for Death and Labeled for Death. A third book, Delta for Death, is coming in 2014.
Visit Michele at: Website: http://www.micheledrier.com
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/AuthorMicheleDrier
Amazon Author Page: http://amzn.com/e/B005D2YC8G or email her at mjdrier@gmail.com
Who’s your favorite vampire? Leave a comment and Michele will donate a Kindle copy of SNAP: The World Unfolds to lucky reader. Use the Rafflecopter form below to enter the drawing for this month’s special giveaway, a Halloween basket with autographed books, candy, Halloween socks and assorted author swag.
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