How odd to meet a vampire with such
strong ties to the living, to family, to the
woman she loves. Gilda speaks of
turning the brothel into a college for
women. With eyes to the future, Gilda
prepares for her own death and
eventually lets The Girl walk in her steps,
with Bird, into their shared darkness as
lovers.

One of my favorites in this collection is
Kathleen Forrest's 0 Captain, My
Captain. This futuristic story takes our
heroine, Lieutenant T. M. Harper on a
four month voyage with the reclusive
Captain Drake. The prose is unhurried,
provocative. When we first meet Drake
we feel her power. "The tall pale figure
in the doorway——dark—haired, clad in
black trousers and a high collared gray
shirt-—posessed a dramatic beauty so
andryogynous that Harper could not have
guessed her sex unless she had known
beforehand."

While their space craft spins through the
galaxy, Harper is drawn into intimate
conversations with Drake, who prods her
with countless questions about herself.
This leads to wonderful, erotic sexual
encounters as well. It is the androgynous
quality, the boyish woman, or feminine
young man that Harper is lost in. Drake
is the most confident of any of these
"bad" women. Her skill as lover is
revealed in Harper's constant cravings
and desire. In Drake we find a vampire
who nourishes herself on something
other than blood.

  
      

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The space voyage becomes for Harper as
equally dreamlike in her inner
explorations with Drake. Eventually she
catches a glimpse of Drake in her
vampire state. This creates a tension, a
loathing for what has passed between
them. It also forces Drake into revealing
her secrets, her life story. Harper is
aghast that for Drake she is food, that
their sex is a form of nourishment. Drake
responds, "Your body is not my food.
Your pleasure is my food.“

Their are eight stories in this collection.
Most are written by contemporary
lesbian writers, familiar to us. Dracula
Retold, a funny feminist twist, starts off
the collection. Pat Califa's The Vampires,
is set in a S&M bar, Purgatory. The
introduction by editor Pam Keesey,
delivers a nice mix of personal
exploration of lesbian vampire lore and
historical information on the origins of
such creatures. "Although Stoker's
vampire bears the name Dracula, there is
reason to believe that the activities that
take place in the novel are actually based
on the life of Elizabeth Bathory, a
Hungarian countess of the sixteenth
century, brought to trial for the torture
and murder of between 150 and 650
young women and girls...Trial records
confirm that the countess and her
accomplices killed an extraordinaiy
number of young women after having
tortured them, and it was said that these
murderess gave her a certain erotic
pleasure. the victims were often stripped

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July/August 1994

naked, and most were bled. There were
also rumors that she bathed in the blood of
her victims."

The introduction is filled with chilling
information, adding to our lesbian
vampire mysfique. Keesey writes, "the
frequent references to Bathory's sexual
preference and her associations with
cross-dressing are particularly interesting,
especially in the light of the use of her
character in the later development of the
lesbian vampire image." As noted by
Keesey, these stories are not included in
other anthologies because they are not of
mainstream appeal. This collection is an
attempt to present both the old myths and
the renewed versions. Sometimes
frightening, even horrifying, and
sometimes erotically stimulating, these
stories add to our image of ourselves and
our sisters.

Whatever your reading preference is,
include this on your summer list. Keesey
ends the introduction with an invitation.
"Superstition has it that you must invite a
vampire to cross the threshold before the
vampire can enter. I'd like to invite you to
cross this threshold and meet the vampires
that await you within." V

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