Love At First Bite…Can We?
From decadent seven-layer chocolate truffle cake to handsome vampires across the street, there are hundreds of ways that you can find love at first bite. Love is an action word, not a noun, and it means that you have made a choice about something. I choose to love chocolate ice cream, and it chooses to love me back by refusing to leave my side…or my behind…or my belly. I also choose to love my husband, even when he does things that I can’t stand—like leaving the toilet seat up so I have a wet mess in the middle of the night.
Do you believe in love at first sight though? I’m one of those people who find this outlook to be flawed, although I do believe that I can really like what I see at first glance. Is it love? No, it isn’t love, because love is earned over time through a faithful partnership with ups and downs. You love each other after spending a lot of time getting to one another, appreciating them for who they are and how they treat you, not just for the way they look on the first few dates.
The vampire trend is sweeping the world, whether you like the touchy-feely emotional vampires from Twilight or the old-school terrors from Dracula or Anne Rice’s stories. Some are portrayed as good guys, biting only when they have to and falling in love (and finding love in return). Others are straight-up nightmares, killing victims at random and having no pity or remorse for the lives they’ve ruined. In a few stories, Vampire B falls in love and changes, and these are the stories I like best. I could find myself falling in love with that type of vampire, who can appreciate someone because they’ve seen the worst the world has to offer.
One of the most important things to remember is that you have to keep an open mind when it comes to falling in love. Growing up on Disney fairy tales made me totally unprepared for real love, since I fully expected to find a handsome prince and live happily ever after in his castle far away. When that didn’t happen, I had to readjust my views of love and the “ideal partner.”
Hyeon Jin and her father each discover that love can be found in the most unexpected places, even with bloodsuckers! Each falls in love with a member of the same family and finds true love in the Kong Pub novel Third Vampire Shadows, a great read for anyone wanting to learn about what it really means to fall in love.