From 18th Century poetry up to modern 3D cinema, the vampire has developed a genre in its own right. Leaving behind its roots in phantasmagoria and horror, taking in romance, action and adventure, as well as flights of science fiction fantasy and political allegory. The vampire is a part of all these fields of artistry and beyond them, a melting pot of imagination and invention that has captivated audiences around the world. In the first part of this volume, Andrew M. Boylan - author of the famous vampire blog Taliesin Meets the Vampires, looks at the genesis of the vampire genre from Ossenfelder's poem Der Vampir to Bram Stoker's seminal novel Dracula. The second part of the book spreads eclectically out from Dracula, just as the genre spread, taking in some famous kissing cousins of the genre as well as looking at the vampire's changing relationship with the divine and following the toothsome bloodsuckers out into space.

The Concilium Sanguinarius, the Council of Blood who rule the vampires with an iron fist and manipulate the mortal world from the shadows, with a deftness born of the countless centuries. In New York, as the millennium moves and the twenty first Century dawns, a female vampire, Danaan, feels pangs of loneliness and begins to search the night for a companion. Also in the city is Ymochel, outcast and distrusted, and eager for revenge on the Concilium and, more specifically, Danaan. Theirs is a history that crosses boundless centuries and a myriad taboos, but now their histories converge in the most violent of ways. But do they act alone, or is a more sinister power at work? What occurs between them threatens the entire stability of vampire society.