{"id":2344,"date":"2020-03-11T01:05:54","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T05:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/?p=2344"},"modified":"2020-03-10T19:53:04","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T23:53:04","slug":"dracula-re-imagined-or-the-cursed-manuscript-by-alexa-piper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/2020\/03\/11\/dracula-re-imagined-or-the-cursed-manuscript-by-alexa-piper\/","title":{"rendered":"Dracula Re-Imagined or The Cursed Manuscript by Alexa Piper"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dracula Re-Imagined or The Cursed Manuscript<\/strong>
\nBy Alexa Piper<\/p>\n

A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine is my re-imagining of Dracula, but perhaps very suitably so, it was not an easy thing to bring into the world, and just like any vampire tale ever told, there was quite some transformation in and to it.<\/p>\n

The first draft of this story happened when I was a less experienced writer, when my prose and voice were not yet as developed as they are now. But I was a reader of course, and I loved Bram Stoker\u2019s vampire novel, and Gary Oldman\u2019s Dracula had also left an impression on me growing up.<\/p>\n

So I wrote a story that was quite dark, quite short, though at the time, it was among the longer things I\u2019d written. It wasn\u2019t as sensual as it would become, and so I almost saw the story of my version of Dracula and his strange castle published in a science fiction and fantasy genre magazine under my real name, Alexandra Seidel.<\/p>\n

But then, that magazine died, quite suddenly, and the story never did manage to go out into the world. I never even got a hold of the editor, there was just silence and a domain name that eventually led nowhere, a ruin in the Internet age.<\/p>\n

I reworked that story over time because I liked it, because there was something about it that drew me into the telling. At one point, I started writing erotic romance as Alexa Piper, and I thought, well, let\u2019s take my dark Dracula tale and make it even darker still, throw in some chains and more blood (in truth, the chains had always been there).<\/p>\n

That tale I sent to Loose Id, a publisher some may be familiar with. They requested to see the full manuscript, but instead of an offer, I got a note that the publisher was closing, and that they couldn\u2019t acquire new material.<\/p>\n

That was the second place that had shown an interest in A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine and had just died.<\/p>\n

I continued to rework it and submit it. The consensus was that it was beautifully written, but too dark thematically. One publisher told me they would take it if I could remove the dubious consent, though they also told me they didn\u2019t think doing so was right for this story and that changing it would take away some of its allure.<\/p>\n

I agreed, and the dubious consent stayed in. I reworked the story again, or rather, at that stage, I refined it. My Dracula is no longer that Dracula, he is another creature entirely.<\/p>\n

Then I sent it to Changeling Press, hoping they wouldn\u2019t close upon reading it. So far, things are looking good.<\/p>\n

I will say though that the editing wasn\u2019t easy. There were strange formatting issues, lost comments, a weird continuity error I couldn\u2019t really account for when it was pointed out to me. But it is here now, A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine is finally out in the world to find readers that will love it as much as I loved working on it and shaping it over the years.<\/p>\n

Of course when your e-reader suddenly fails or when you find yourself having dreams of being watched and hunted, you have been warned; I had those same dreams too.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Excerpt from A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine:<\/strong><\/p>\n

He knew I wanted a story about him, and I knew he would do anything to not tell it, to avoid my curiosity like the smell of rotting flesh in high summer. Or, sometimes, he would distract me with his cotton candy voice, holding my mouth shut with his lips and gently weave cobwebs over my eyes, shivers all over my skin. He would mesmerize me, yes, weaving his body into mine, his strong muscles coiling, a snake that charms the snake charmer. And he would hold me and taste me and overpower my senses until my mind was foggy, my skin glistening. But through all his charming, the gentle and the less gentle, he could not expect me to forget that I had questions. I had come here to hear his story. That was what I wanted.<\/p>\n

Get your copy of A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine:<\/strong> https:\/\/www.changelingpress.com\/a-tale-of-honey-and-garnet-wine-b-3002<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"Connect with me:<\/strong>
\nTwitter: https:\/\/twitter.com\/ProwlingPiper<\/a>
\nInstagram: https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/piperthewriter\/<\/a>
\nWebsite: www.alexapiper.com<\/a>
\nFacebook: https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AlexaPiperWrites\/<\/a>
\nNewsletter: http:\/\/eepurl.com\/gRJq3T<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dracula Re-Imagined or The Cursed Manuscript By Alexa Piper A Tale of Honey and Garnet Wine is my re-imagining of Dracula, but perhaps very suitably so, it was not an easy thing to bring into the world, and just like any vampire tale ever told, there was quite some transformation in and to it. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2345,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[142,281,64],"class_list":["post-2344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guestposts","tag-dracula","tag-featured","tag-vampires"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/Honey50.jpg?fit=700%2C1062&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kq3e-BO","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2344"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2348,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344\/revisions\/2348"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kate-hill.com\/compellingbeastsblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}