To believe or not to believe?

***ETA: Contest winner chosen by Randomizer was Lyndsey-Jane , who said, "I would prefer to know that they 100% did NOT exist, as with my health/mobility issues I'd make an easy meal."

Lol, I think we all would be easy meals if paranormal creatures existed ;). Lyndsey-Jane, email me at frostlight1 AT yahoo DOT com with your shipping address! ****


Hi everyone! Thanks for coming out for my first post on Supernatural Underground. For my topic, I'll be chatting about beliefs. No, you don't need to back away - there'll be no preaching from me ;-). But one of the things I get asked a lot as a vampire writer is, do you believe vampires exist? My standard response is that I haven’t seen anything to believe they do, but I’d never say never to the possibility. Is that a cop-out? Maybe, but just because I’ve never seen anything supernaturally strange in my life doesn’t mean I’ve slammed the door on the possibility that it might exist. Hey, I watch Ghost Hunters, and occasionally there are some weird things caught on tape or audio. Does that prove ghosts exist? I can’t say. There’s a big “what if” factor to the paranormal, and it plays both ways. What if the hazy thing on the video is just a trick of the light, instead of an apparition trying to manifest itself? Or what if that voice on the recorder was picked up from crossing signals with another TV or radio station, instead of a spirit trying to communicate?

So, I’m open to the idea that vampires, werewolves, zombies, or other creatures might exist – and that all the legends about them are nothing more than the imaginings of our ancestors, or the playing out of cultural taboos in monster form. I don’t need a solid belief in the paranormal to write about it. I do it because it’s fun to imagine answers to the “what if” factor it represents for me. Before I wrote about vampires, for instance, I loved to read about them, and I still watch almost every new vampire movie that comes out.

I also think because the paranormal can’t be completely proved or disproved (to my satisfaction, anyway) that it enhances its appeal in fiction. If it was possible to slam the door shut – no room for possibilities – that creatures such as vampires, or werewolves, zombies, etc., never existed, then it might dampen some of my enjoyment of them in fiction. The “what if” factor allows my imagination to delve deeper into the paranormal world I write about, whereas the proof that our world truly has never and will never contain anything beyond what we now know would hinder that free reign of ideas for me.

However, the opposite scenario might be even more detrimental to my love of the paranormal. If it were possible to prove, beyond a shadow of scientific doubt, that vampires or other supernatural creatures really did exist, I’m not sure I would keep writing about the paranormal. After all, *wink* I might hesitate to begin another vampire novel if I knew a real vampire might read it one day – and perhaps do more than voice their disapproval of the way I represented his or her kind, heh.

But what about you? If you had the choice, would you want it 100% proved that paranormal creatures did NOT exist? (so you’d never have to worry about whether the person sitting next to you might morph into a werewolf on the full moon, for example ;). Or would you want it 100% proved that paranormal creatures DID exist? (which would mean you’d have to be careful about people who needed to be “invited” into your house before they could enter! ;) Which would you prefer, and why? Everyone who tells me their preference in the comments will be entered to win a signed copy of FIRST DROP OF CRIMSON, which contains vampires, ghosts, and demons, among other paranormal elements. Contest is open now and closes at at 11:59PM tonight, June 4th, EST. Winner will be drawn by Randomizer and announced on the blog. Contest open to US and international readers.















-Jeaniene Frost