Interview With a Vampire Slayer

Interview with a Vampire Slayer

by

Piper Maitland

I traveled to an undisclosed location in Morocco to interview Dr. Jude Barrett, a British biochemist and vampire hunter.

While we drank mint tea and ate hummus, I asked him about vampirism.

Piper: Dr. Barrett, it’s my understanding that you discovered a scientific basis for vampirism. What sort of doctor are you? A physician?

Jude: No, I have a Ph.D. in biochemistry. I was employed by a pharmaceutical company in Yorkshire, England, and I conducted research on mice. I discovered the R-99 gene, which is responsible for longevity.

Piper: How did your research lead to this discovery?

Jude: I induced mutations into the mice via low amounts of radiation. They began craving blood and became hypersexual. Also, they had an extraordinary life span. These same qualities exist in a subset of humans: vampires.

Piper: But how can vampires really exist?

Jude: Are you familiar with Methicillin-resistent Staphylococcus Aurea? It’s better known as MRSA, an antibiotic-resistant bug. If you wished to create a strain, all you need is a petri dish filled with staphylococcus. Add penicillin. It will kill ninety-nine percent of the staph. Take the surviving one percent and culture them. You now have bacteria that are resistant to penicillin.

Piper: Why are they resistant?

Jude: It’s a defense mechanism of the bacterium. If you put the penicillin-resistant strain into a petri dish and apply erythromycin, the antibiotic will kill a majority of the bacteria. Culture the survivors, and you have an organism that’s resistant to penicillin and erythromycin. If you repeat this process ad infinitum, adding various antibiotics, you will eventually create a superior organism—one that’s resistant to all antibiotics. And it’s indestructible.

Piper: You’re saying vampirism evolved like MRSA?

Jude: It makes sense, doesn’t it? The survival of the fittest, etc. Vampires began in small numbers and multiplied. They’re adaptive. Strong, hard to kill. And they destroy the competing organism.

Piper: But how can they subdue humans?

Jude: They’re predators. They are built to stalk, attack, and control their prey. Vampiric physiology gives them a biological edge.

Piper: Name one.

Jude: Well, for starters, they emit a distinct smell, rather like the fruity odor from ketones, but they can also smell of menthol. This unique hidrosis—which is the Greek word for perspiration, by the way—affects a human’s brain chemistry. It relaxes their muscles to the point of paralysis, but it also generates a sense of calmness. Also, it has an aphrodisiac effect. Hidrosis helps a vampire restrain prey. Incidentally, this chemical in a vampire’s perspiration is similar to a terpene. I’m sure you’ve heard of Nepetalactone?

Piper: Catnip?

Jude: Yes.

Piper: I have a cat, and she’s immune to catnip. She ignores the toys I set out.

Jude: Perhaps she lacks the olfactory receptor. Some felines have it, some don’t. It’s genetic.

Piper: If your bat-nip theory is true, then people would faint whenever they got near a vampire. Sidewalks and train stations would be filled with paralyzed humans.

Jude: When the chemical is excreted by a vampire’s sweat glands, it evaporates and diffuses into the air and becomes less potent. If humans inhale it, they feel relaxed. But it’s fleeting. A high concentration of this molecule is found in a vampire’s blood and saliva.

Piper: Why don’t vampires succumb to their own chemical? Why doesn’t it paralyze them?

Jude: Is a spider killed by its own venom? An effective predator isn’t harmed by its own methods of predation.

Piper: What about a vampire’s intellect? Is it superior?

Jude: A vampire’s IQ is similar to a humans: it varies. Some vamps are brilliant, some are average, etc. But a vampire’s brain is more developed than a human’s. Some vamps are quite gifted with telepathy. Interestingly enough, vampirism often brings out personality disorders, such as OCD and problems with impulse control.

Piper: In Hollywood movies, vampires can shape-shift into bats. Is this a myth?

Jude: Yes. Vampires can’t change into bats. They are a sub-set of humans, but they’re physically stronger, run faster, and never become ill. They heal at an extraordinary rate.

Piper: Can they be killed?

Jude: Yes, but it would have to be a catastrophic injury to the heart or brain.

Piper: But what about sunlight?

Jude: Vampires can venture outside on overcast days, but they must wear sun block and protective gear—and they can’t stay outside for extended periods.

Piper: Does this sensitivity have a biological basis?

Jude: Their immune systems are hyperactive. Their ketonin is sensitive to ultra-violet rays, and any direct exposure to the sun will cause second and third degree burns. Also, light affects the eyes; it causes corneal abrasions, even blindness.

Piper: What about the other myths—garlic, crucifixes, and holy water?

Jude: Garlic has mild antibiotic properties that may alter the taste of blood. As for holy water and crosses, these myths are culture-based. Would a Muslim fear holy water?

Piper: How can a human be turned into a vampire? In horror movies, it takes three bites, and that’s it, you become a vampire.

Jude: It’s not the number of bites. It’s the number of stem cells that pass from the vampire’s body into the prey’s vascular system. And how the prey’s immune system reacts.

Piper: I’m not following you. Stem cells?

Jude: When I was studying mice, the blood analysis revealed an abundance of stem cells. It was a unique stem cell, rather like a stem cell leukemia, but it wasn’t fatal. It grew faster than cancer cells. My research was terminated before I could lean more.

Piper: I have one more question. The MRSA bug is still evolving. Are vampires also changing?

Jude: Definitely.

Piper: What should we expect?

Jude: We’ll have to wait and see. If we’re still around.

 

Photo Credits: Shutterstock, Dreamstime, Fotolia

 

Creating Fictional Mansions: Daphne Du Maurier's Manderley

Photo Credit: Shutterstock

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again…

I stood by the iron gate leading to the drive.”

When people ask how I became a writer, I blame it on my sickly childhood, a book-lined room, and Daphne Du Maurier’s fondness for old mansions. It began when I was a young girl, my mother sent me to Girl Scout camp. After a day of caving, I spiked a high fever and couldn’t breathe. The doctors were puzzled. They took my mother aside and asked if I had been exposed to tuberculosis. X-rays and skin tests finally determined that I’d contracted histoplasmosis, a rather common malady in middle Tennessee.

Fearing that my brother would catch the disease, my mother sent me to my grandmother’s house in the piney woods of Mississippi. My Mimi’s home didn’t have servants or sweeping views of the ocean, but its cozy warmth and smells of fresh baked bread were healing forces. I spent a rainy morning in Mimi’s book-lined study—a rare treat because my mother did not purchase books and borrowed them from her friends or the local library.

On Mimi’s shelf, I found a tattered copy of Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. I curled up in the window seat, and for the next few days, I entered the world of Manderley. I could see Jasper, the spotted Spaniel dog, as he followed the unnamed narrator around the stone mansion, the sinister housekeeper, Danvers, lurking in the shadows. I could feel the warm, sandy grass as I walked down the path to the sea. When the narrator sat down at the dinner table, I saw her lift the linen napkin and run her finger over the ornate, monogrammed R. When she walked down Manderley’s secluded driveway, I was right behind her.

In real life, apparently Daphne Du Maurier was a bit of a house stalker, one of my favorite vices. Her young mind was shaped by two English estates. The first, Milton Park, was located in Northamptonshire, and Daphne spent the summer in the lavish gardens. Later, Hitchcock would use Milton as the inspiration for Manderley’s interiors.

The drive wound away in front of me, twisting and turning as it had always done….

But it was the second house, Menabilly, that shaped Du Maurier's vision of Manderley, along with her other fictional mansions (My Cousin Rachel and The King’s General).

Here's a video tour of Daphne at Menabilly:

While working on Rebecca,Daphne would walk around the ruined house, and while she mentally refurbished the manse, her writer’s imagination was firmly engaged. Using words, she constructed a hybrid of Milton Park and Menabilly, and a house with another M-name was born: Manderley. Daphne constructed the grey stones, soaring ceilings, and windows with glimpses of the water.

I recovered from my illness and returned to Tennessee, but part of me stayed in Manderley. I became a seasoned house stalker. I’d walk around the neighborhood, ringing doorbells, boldly asking owners if I could tour their homes. Oddly enough, these kind souls never refused.

My mother forbade me to become a writer, and I ended up with a B.S. in nursing. I wrote in a stuffy closet under the staircase and papered the walls with rejection slips. During those long, unpublished years, Manderley was never far from my mind. When I began writing full time, I wasn’t sure how to build a fictional world, so I turned to Rebecca. Fictional houses became just as important as my characters—in fact, the houses became characters.

In Acquainted With the Night, I “designed” a farmhouse in rural Tennessee, a cliff-top monastery, a stone house in Oxford, an English country estate, and a London pharmaceutical building. My favorite house was an Italian vampire’s villa. I placed it on an island near Venice:

The villa reminded Caro of a floating hotel. The four-story Italianate was the color of oyster shells. Stone gargoyles peered down from an upper balcony. The island wasn’t landscaped so much as sculpted. Stone nymphs danced around a fountain. Further out, boxwood hedges formed crosses. Next to the front steps, topiaries were carved into mythological beasts.

The mansion’s name is Villa Primaverina. Inside, it had been modernized: a mirrored weight room, lap pool, media center, game room, elevators, blood bank, and a virtual golf course. Naturally the manse has a windowless, book-jammed library or two.

Source: Shutterstock

In real life, I will soon move to a farmhouse, mainly because I fell in love with the winding driveway. It’s far from the sea, but the setting has already sparked my imagination, because just last night, I dreamed of Manderley.

Acquainted With the Night book trailer:

Interior Design 101 for Vampires

What if a wealthy, gorgeous vampire asked you to decorate his mansion? Would you run? Put on a garlic necklace? Or accept the job?

 Find out the secrets of immortal design at Happily Ever After, where I'm today's guest poster. Leave Jess a message for a chance to win a copy of AWTN.

 

Photo Credits: Shutterstock, Dreamstime, Fotolia

Piper's Blog Tour Dates plus the Kindle Giveaway

If you'd like to check out giveaways where Piper will be touring for Acquainted With the Night, the updated schedule can be found here: http://www.pipermaitland.com/about-piper/tour-dates/.

Emily has created and added "grab this" buttons on the sidebar.

Also, on http://www.pipermaitland.com/, you can find cool info about the novel--character sketches, photos, a faux Wiki page for Historia Immortalis, an 8th century illustrated manuscript, and even a scientific abstract on the science of vampirism. If you'd like to listen to the behind-the-scenes music that inspired Acquainted With the Night, just click on the playlist.

Finally, the Kindle giveaway ends November 22nd.