Getting into the spirit of Halloween.

Romeo and Juliet and Vampires  by Claudia Galbel

Adapted from William Shakespeare

You are deluded, Romeo. Vampires do not have the capability to love. They are heartless."

The Capulets and the Montagues have some deep and essential differences. Blood differences. Of course, the Capulets can escape their vampire fate, and the Montagues can try not to kill their undead enemies. But at the end of the day, their blood feud is unstoppable. So it's really quite a problem when Juliet, a vampire-to-be, and Romeo, the human who should be hunting her, fall desperately in love. What they don't realize is how deadly their love will turn out to be—or what it will mean for their afterlives. . . .

This riotous twist on the ultimate tale of forbidden romance is simply to die for.

I was browsing the book section at Walmart and found this book.  I laughed. My wondered, what will they make into vampires next? Nothing was sacred.  I picked it up, remembered that I was participating in the Spooktacular blog hop and thought it would make an interesting giveaway. Now, I will turn to read "Little Vampire Women".  Another one that made me laugh, I'm interested to see how it turns out.

Of course, I couldn't resist the temptation of reading it.  I made another trip to Walmart and bought another copy.  Sheesh! I advertised that I was giving away a new copy, and so my  conscience wouldn't let me give away a copy that I read.

Despite my cynical nature, this worked.  The Capulets are Vampires and the Montagues are vampire hunters.  The prose is contemporary, I missed "Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo." The balcony scene is there, but kids will understand the dialogue a little easier. I am not opposed to the trend to make classic works into works with a paranormal theme.  My hope is that if young adults (or older people like me who like YA lit.) read the knock-offs, they will become interested in the original work.

Claudia Gable does change the ending a little. It works.  Not so much of a tragedy.  I'm giving this work 3 stars.  Good, not close to being a favorite.

family traditions

My family has a tradition that the Monday night before Halloween we carve pumpkins that we have grown in our garden in the backyard.  Then we have treats and look at the artwork we have created with a pumpkin.

I've tried everything I know how, even had my 15 year old son help me, and I cannot turn these pictures around.  My kids carving the pumpkins.  In case you are wondering what is on the back door?  I collect magnets from the family trips that we go on. 

Little Vampire Women

By Louisa May Alcott and Lynn Messina

"Christmas won't be Christmas without any corpses."

The dear, sweet March sisters are back, and Marmee has told them to be good little women. Good little vampire women, that is. That's right: Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy have grown up since you last read their tale, and now they have (much) longer lives and (much) more ravenous appetites

For me, this is a book that is hard to review.  The reason?  I didn't particularly like it.

Shifting this classic into a paranormal knock-off just didn't  work.  I found the references to their state of vampirism very tedious.  There were umpteen references to the differences between them and their human counterparts.  Their desire for "corpses for Christmas" was gross.   They would bring cute little critters into their home and suck them dry.

The funny thing is, that as a general rule, I like vampire books.  I read them all of the time and many are on my to-read list.  I practically drool when a new one comes out.

The positive spin:  it does closely follow the events of the original, just with the vampire twist.  Lynn Messina is not a bad author, this book just didn't work for me.  2 stars