As I stated in my Writing History posting, the novel evolved out of a series of short stories I wrote in 1989-90 and published in The Thought. That series was titled Song of the Vamphyri, which at one time I also considered using as a title for the novel, or the novel series. Many of the same characters that were in the short story series are in the novel, and the broad outline of the initial story arc is the same. As the novels are fuller, richer stories, there are other characters and I go into a lot more depth in creating them.
What isn't the same? Quite a lot. The short stories were set in the late 1980s. The novels are contemporary, set in the world of 2008 on. The short stories were full of angst, as I was at that time. Also, I wrote the short stories as a first person narrative. That is, Victor Trent was telling the story himself. The novel is done in third person which I believe makes the story stronger. In the first short story Victor was reflecting on it all. In the novel, it is 'you are there.'
Most of the ideas I used in the short stories are being incorporated into the novels in some fashion. Others I am leaving behind. I think I have matured as a writer. I certainly have a lot more life experience now than I did then. Some scenes in the short story were just bizarre. I had this scene where a vampire who had been turned as a child decided, after a thousand years in child form, he'd had enough. Victor took him to the shore of Chesapeake Bay and the vampire just asked him to stay a safe distance away and time how long it took before he blew up after sunrise. Victor just did it. Victor in the novel - no way he would do that.
And thus it goes...
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