Apart from watching Twilight a few months ago, I knew nothing at all about the vampire genre when I bought this anthology. I've never seen/read Dracula, even. But a while ago I had an idea for a vampire story. I knew a lot about the 'world' that will form the backdrop to the story, but nothing about vampires. So, I decided, if I really was going to include a vampire element in this story, I needed to know something about the conventions of the vampire genre.

So I bought this YA anthology - which includes stories by Libba Bray, Cassandra Clare, Holly Black and Sarah Rees Brennan - last Saturday, alongside the latest offerings by my two favourite writers, Peter Robinson and Val McDermid. I started reading Peter Robinson's book - also a collection of short stories - first, then picked up The Eternal Kiss and read Libba Bray's story, 'The Thirteenth Step'. This was a brilliant story about vampires feeding on drug-addicts on a 12-step program in an undesirable part of New York. I was hooked and read the stories in order, leaving Peter Robinson ignored on the bedside table. As in any anthology, not all the stories were good, but some, especially Cassandra Clare's (hers was definitely, for me, the best in the book, with a great twist, and I'm really inspired to read more of her work) and Libba Bray's, were excellent. And because they're YA, many of them felt like those old stories I read in Jackie in the 1970s - only with vampires and rather more gritty - so, oddly, there was something of a nostalgia element as well.

Anyway, the best thing about the book for me was discovering a new genre that I like. I read mainly crime or girls' own-style books, and in recent years I've found myself getting tired of and turned off by the increasing brutality in crime novels. And if the crime novel's not brutal, then it's wise-cracking chick lit, which I probably dislike even more. So I'm down to only two or three crime writers that I still follow. As for the girls' own, I've pretty much completed my collection now, and don't have anything much left that's going to be new to me. So it's good I've discovered a whole new genre out there to read. Oh yes, and now I know a bit more about vampires, I might get that urban fantasy written at last.

On a more negative note, one of the things I noticed in the anthology was something that dorianegray had commented on in terms of an urban fantasy in her LJ recently. There was little to no sense of place in these stories. Even Libba Bray's New York setting could have been a grungy part of Melbourne, London, Moscow ... anywhere. I wonder if this is deliberate in terms of urban fantasy and the ability to sell it anywhere? That it's somewhere or nowhere but could be anywhere? That way, everyone can relate, so everyone will buy, regardless of where they live, as happens with more traditional, other-world fantasies. Perhaps the fantasy experts on my flist can enlighten me?

I haven't read the book because it never appealed, but I thought I'd try the DVD (reason being it takes less time to watch a movie). We watched it over two nights because I kept nodding off to sleep during the first half. (It was that gripping.) The second half was much better, though. I thought it only took off when Bella went home to meet Edward's family. And at the end I was quite interested to know what will happen next. What will happen between Edward and the young Native American lad whose name I have forgotten? And what was the female vampire (Victoria?) who appeared at the end up to? I'm almost tempted to read the second book in the saga to find out.

However, I have realised just how little I know about vampires. I didn't realise, for example, that they don't eat or drink. Or sleep. Or that they could move so fast or play baseball so well. Or that they could tell what people are thinking. I don't think I've actually read a book about vampires, not even Dracula. I don't think I've ever watched a vampire movie either. So no wonder I didn't know how much was based on vampire myth and how much had been made up by Stephanie Meyer.

Why are people so into vampires at the moment? The YA shelves are crammed full of books with titles like Vampire Academy. I'm not sure I really get it. And why is sex with a vampire such a very desirable thing?