Please allow me to introduce myself . . . D. B. Reynolds

I have a weird brain that memorizes song lyrics without me even knowing it.  And they pop up at the strangest times.  Did you get this one? Here’s a video with sound and lyrics.

This song was apt, though, because I write of otherworldly things.  So, please allow me to introduce myself and my world of kick-ass women and sexy Alpha males–vampires and werewolves and who knows what else?  But let’s start with the vampires …

Several years ago, I decided I didn’t like what was happening to vampires in the current genre literature, both paranormal romance and urban fantasy. They were being turned into sensitive guys who drove Volvos (a Volvo? Really?), who hated what they were and only drank blood (ewww) because they had to. They were full of angst and torment and wanted only to do good.  Ick.

So I decided to write about the real vampires, creatures who had ascended to the top of the food chain through blood and violence and who reveled in what they’d become, building empires that spanned human generations and living according to their own rules and no one else’s. My vampires are lethal predators–deadly, aggressive, territorial and, of course, sexy as hell.

In my world, the vampire hierarchy centers around the Vampire Lords. These very few and all-powerful vampires hold the lives of every vampire within their domain. No vampire exists but that he (or she) is beholden to one of the Lords or is powerful enough to be a Lord in his own right. In all of North America, there are only eight Vampire Lords, each controlling a separate territory with rigidly maintained boundaries. The Vampire Lords are fiercely competitive with one another and tolerate no trespassing.

Each of the books in my series, Vampires in America, focuses on one of the territories and its Lord. The first book, RAPHAEL, introduces the Lord of the Western Territory. Raphael is almost 500 years old and controls the largest of the eight North American territories. He is scarily powerful, possibly the most powerful vampire alive. When someone near and dear to him is kidnapped, Raphael hires a human investigator Cynthia Leighton, to track down the human kidnappers.

And the rest as they say, is history.

Book Two continues the story of Raphael and Cyn, but with the introduction of JABRIL Karim, a vampire who values no life but his own, who enslaves those he desires, steals whatever he covets and destroys anyone who stands in his way. When he sets his sights on Cyn, he crosses a line which can only end in someone’s death.

And my newest book is RAJMUND, Book Three of the Vampires in America series. Due out from ImaJinn Books on July 30th, it introduces Rajmund (RYE-mund) Gregor. Rajmund is a younger and more modern vampire as compared to Raphael. He is the Master of Manhattan, New York, which he controls on behalf of his Sire, Krystof Sapieha, who is Lord of the Northeastern Territory. Krystof is very old. Too old. He is going slowly mad and the territory is crumbling around him. Power in the vampire world rarely passes without violence.  Of all Krystof’s vampire children, only Rajmund is powerful enough to destroy his Sire and seize the territory for himself.  But first, there is the matter of some missing women and the human police who suspect their disappearances are the work of a vampire.

And that leaves my werewolves. This is a new series for me. Just released from Siren Publishing, HEART OF THE WOLF introduces the universe of my wolves with the story of Renjiro Roesner and Kathryn Avinger.

Kathryn is the daughter of the North American Alpha. Young, beautiful and obedient, Kathryn was married off at the age of eighteen to a much older and wealthy human, finding herself neatly trapped in an abusive prison of money and privilege.

Renjiro is a powerful and charismatic wolf, an enforcer for Kathryn’s father and, once upon a time, Kathryn’s promised husband. Returning from a mission to find Kathryn married and gone, Ren left the country, bitter and betrayed. But when someone tries to murder Kathryn at her husband’s funeral, Ren comes home to protect the only woman he ever loved.

What’s next in my world? I don’t know for sure.

But I’m thinking . . . demons.

Visit me at http://dbreynolds.wordpress.com for free Vampire Vignettes, contests and more.

See you in August!

DBR