Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Historical Vampire Fiction - Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

I am an unabashed fan of the Le Comte de Saint-Germain. This is one of the first vampire series started reading back in 1978! I really enjoyed Hotel Transylvania and I've all of the St. Germain novels and related series. I really like how Saint Germain is woven into the tapestry of the time period of each book. Here is the series. Please note that there are multiple covers for some of the books. I've tried to use the most recent.

What long running series do you read?

1. Hotel Transylvania (1978)



The classic tale that introduced the legendary Le Comte de Saint-Germain, first published in 1978 and spawning 14 titles in the Saint-Germain epic, is now available in paperback. A fixture in 1740s Parisian society, Saint-Germain is a perfect gentleman--and a vampire. When the fiery young Madeline falls in love with him, a group of evil sorcerers targets her for their black mass--and only Saint-Germain can save her soul.










2. The Palace (1978)



The anticipated paperback release of the second title in Yarbro's long-running Saint-Germain series featuring immortal vampire Francesco Ragoczy da San Germano. Secluded in his Renaissance Florence palace, he falls for a beautiful courtesan and loses all desire for isolation.


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
   
3. Blood Games (1980)



Blending the dark eroticism of the vampire with the suspenseful adventure in history's most exotic locales, Yarbro's Saint-Germain epic continues in this third book that takes place in the last chaotic days of Nero's Rome.















4. Path of the Eclipse (1981)



There is trouble in 13th century China. A wind blows from the west and has a name--Jenghiz Khan. Pledged to help a beautiful woman warrior, St. Germain has a terrible secret--he has the power to bestow death or eternal life as a vampire














5. Tempting Fate (1981)



The Russian Revolution and the end of World War I sets in motion Saint-Germain's flight into Germany with his adopted daughter only to find tragedy on the streets of Munich as the Nazi party begins its rise to power.*















6. The Saint-Germain Chronicles (1983)


Five stories of Saint-Germain's activities in the twentieth century.*





















7. Darker Jewels (1993)

Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's immortal vampire, the Comte de Saint-Germain, is one of the most popular characters of his kind ever created. Publishers Weekly has called him a "veritable Prince Charming of the darker arts."

In Darker Jewels the Count is sent by the King Of Poland to the court of Russia's Ivan IV, to use his alchemical skills to craft unearthly gems for the mad emperor. there he finds not only dark intrigue and heart-stopping danger, but a breathtakingly beautiful woman to whom he loses his heart.







8. Better in the Dark (1993)

Here at last is a long-hinted-at chapter in the undead existence of the immortal Count Saint-Germain: the story of Ranegonda of Saxony, one of the three great loves of Saint-Germian's life.

937 A.D. The Saxon fortress of Leosan is under the almost unheard-of rule of a woman. The Gerefa of the fortress has become a monk, leaving his sister, Ranegonda, to rule in his name as best she can--and to deal with his embittered, headstrong wife as well. Into this tense and dire situation comes Saint-Germain. Shipwrecked on the Baltic shore, near the true death, he is found by Ranegonda, whom he will come to love for the gift of blood she gives him, and for her own indomitable spirit.


9. Mansions of Darkness (1996)

Ambitious in its scope and provocative in its content, the saga of Count Saint-Germain is a monumental feat of the imagination. Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's powerful and evocative novels have captured Saint-Germain throughout his long existence, from the temples of ancient Eygpt to our present century.

Now the count's endless travels bring him to seventeenth-century Peru, where he finds solace for his loneliness in the arms of an Incan priestess. But mighty Spain has conquered the Incan people--and brought the dreaded attention of the Holy Inquisition to the New World.






10. Writ in Blood (1997)

1910: The great powers of Europe are united by ties of blood, but divided by conflicting ambitions and alliances. Now residing in Russia, Saint-Germain accepts an urgent commission from Czar Nicholas to deliver a top-secret peace proposal to the Czar's kinsmen, King Edward VII of England and Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany. The Czar dares not trust his own ministers: only through Saint-Germain can he hope to avert the coming war. But the Count's mission attracts dangerous enemies, most notably Baron von Wolgast, a scheming manufacturer of munitions who sees no profit in peace. Employing a network of spies and assassins, Von Wolgast plots against Saint-Germain, and when the Count becomes involved with Rowena Saxon, an independent-minded young artist, she too becomes a target of the Baron's malevolence.


11. Blood Roses (1998)

In this lush new novel of the vampire of Saint-Germain, plague has come to France. As the people's fear manifests itself as xenophobia, Saint-Germain flees to avoid the scrutiny that could reveal his true nature -- only to find himself traveling deeper into the peril of the Black Death.

These solidly researched novels show us a Saint-Germain who genuinely learns and grows from a fiend into a being of great gentleness, wisdom, and compassion. The series is probably the most sustained and impressive treatment to date of extreme longevity.





12. Communion Blood (1999)

Olivia Atta Clemens, Saint-Germain's love from the days of Imperial Rome, has died the True Death and left her lavish estates to her servant, Niklos Aurilios, but they have been claimed by a young noble who says he is the long-lost son of Olivia's dead husband. Saint-Germain may not be able to convince a court of Niklos's rights without revealing Olivia's true nature, and therefore, his own.













13. Come Twilight (2000)

Beginning in the 600s, Spain's old blood rituals of animal sacrifice were replaced by the new gods of Christianity and Islam, who demanded no less obedience and allegiance. Saint-Germain becomes trapped in this cauldron of blood, fear, and faith when, he makes a vampire of the beautiful, haughty, tempestuous Csimenae.

Csimenae kills without mercy. She makes vampires without a second thought; and they,

For five hundred years, as waves of war and religion sweep over Spain, Csimenae hunts until her marauding, willful ways expose her vampiric nature. Saint-Germain's centuries of life have taught him that to fall out of step with history is to risk the True Death, a fate Saint-Germain wishes for none of his kind. He must try to save Csimenae-and her clan-but at what price?


14. A Feast in Exile (2001)

A Feast in Exile draws readers back to the time when the Mongol hordes of Timur (known in the West as Tamerlane) swept across fourteenth-century India and Asia. Delhi's civilized veneer crumbles along with its walls. Foreigners, which the vampire Saint-Germain-here called Sanat Ji Mani-surely is, lose their positions, homes, wealth, and sometimes their lives, if they cannot escape the falling city.

Before he can flee Delhi, Sanat Ji Mani must ensure the safety of Avasa Dani, his beautiful ward, who has been abandoned by her husband. Sanat Ji Mani's love has awakened Avasa Dani's every sense; even she will become a vampire upon her death, but she finds no terror in this fate.

Avasa Dani and Rojire, Sanat Ji Mani's servant, successfully make their way out of Delhi, but Sanat Ji Mani himself is trapped. His life is bought by his skills with medicine, but, at Timur's command, he must travel-by day, and exposed to the sun-with the conqueror's army. Crippled and unable to escape, he knows that his vampire nature will soon be revealed, and then...

Avasa Dani, with a worried Rojire at her side, considers her options as a woman without a visible male protector in a land and time ruled by men. While one of Sanat Ji Mani's allies searches desperately for the missing vampire, Saint-Germain and a young acrobat, with whom he has escaped from Timur's forces, make their slow and painful way to freedom. The journey changes them both forever.


15. Night Blooming (2002)


Set in the court of Charlemagne the Great, this is the 15th novel in the popular series about the immortal vampire, Le Comte de Saint-Germain, who meets an albino woman afflicted with stigmata who is accused of witchcraft.
















16. Midnight Harvest (2003)

Blending the dark eroticism of the vampire with high adventure in history's most compelling locales, the story of Saint-Germain is the enduring drama of a lonely hero who walks the earth throughout time, battling for honor...and love. To escape the horrors of the Spanish Civil War, Saint-Germain travels to San Francisco, where he reunites with Rowena Saxon, a past lover whose beauty and wisdom have matured with time. There he offers Rowena a choice: a natural death-or immortality as a vampire. But unknown to the noble exile, an assassin has followed him from Spain, torturing his friends and his associates at every step. The next target will be Rowena, unless the vampire recognizes the peril that both he and his lover face. Will his ignorance achieve what time itself cannot-the death of Saint-Germain?

17. Dark of the Sun (2004)
It is the 6th century of the common era. The vampire Saint-Germain, known in this time as Zangi-Ragozh, is peacefully doing business in Asia when the island of Krakatoa explodes in a massive volcanic eruption. Tidal waves swamp harbors hundreds of miles away, destroying trade ships and their cargoes; tons of ash and dirt are flung into the air.

In the months to come, the world grows colder and darker as the massive volcanic cloud spreads across the globe, blocking sunlight. Sea trade is ravaged. Crops fail. Livestock, and then people, begin to starve. Disease spreads. Panic rises.

As always in times of trouble, foreigners-and the vampire is always a foreigner-become targets. Fleeing toward the West, where he hopes to find safety and sanity, the vampire travels with a nomadic tribe led by Dukkai, a female shaman who soon becomes Zangi-Ragozh's lover.

But Zangi-Ragozh's problems are far from over. His vampire nature is discovered by an enemy; he begins to starve; he is betrayed by one he cared deeply for; he loses everything, even his last sack of his native soil.

With the True Death looming, Zangi-Ragozh tries to reach sanctuary in his ancient homeland.  Transylvania.


18. States of Grace (2005)
Franzicco Ragoczy di Santo-Germano is a successful merchant in Venice. His lavish lifestyle and rumored cache of magnificent jewels have attracted the wrong sort of attention, and without Santo-Germano’s noble—and papal—connections, he might be imprisoned, his property confiscated. Also under surveillance is the vampire’s mistress, the lovely and talented musician Pier-Ariana Salier.

Elsewhere, Ragoczy’s publishing business is being investigated by the Inquisition. Erneste van Amsteljaxter, a writer whose intelligence Ragoczy finds attractive, is tarred with the brush of heresy. Ragoczy is trying to help her, when he learns that Pier-Ariana has disappeared.

Back in Venice Santo-Germano finds that his fortune has been embezzled, and that he is accused of kidnapping, and possibly murdering, a young man who had been spying on the vampire and his mistress. Another spy has discovered Santo-Germano’s true nature and intends to kill him before he can feast on all of Venice!


19. Roman Dusk (2006)


In the unsettled time when Imperial Rome totters on the brink of collapse, the vampire Ragoczy Germainus Sanct’ Franciscus—the Count Saint-Germain—finds himself targeted by a corrupt Roman official and accused of bribery, tax evasion, and treason. The storm that hovers over the vampire grows darker when he is accused of corrupting Ignatia, a young virgin. Her brother, a zealous covert to the new religion of Christianity, threatens to purify Saint-Germain with fire. And fire can destroy even the undead.







20. Borne in Blood (2007)



Borne in Blood is the landmark twentieth volume of the Saint-Germain cycle. Historically accurate, these deeply emotional novels have a devoted readership.

The year is 1817. In Switzerland, the Count has become intrigued by the work of an Austrian noble who is investigating the properties of blood, a subject always of key interest to a vampire. But when the noble’s beautiful young ward fixates sexually on the Count, the vampire fears that it is his blood the Austrian will be most interested in!






21. Saint-Germain Memoirs (2008)


Focusing on Saint-Germain—one of the genre’s most memorable vampires—this collection follows the dark immortal from ancient Greece to the present as tales of his timeless life are recounted. Also included is a brief essay by the author about her world-renowned vampire, with an Introduction by Sharon A. Russell.













22. A Dangerous Climate (2008)


The vampire Count Saint-Germain, disguised as a missing Hungarian nobleman, is on a spy mission in the heart of Czarist Russia.  Almost by the power of his will alone, it seems, Peter the Great is wrestling the city that will one day be St. Petersburg out of swampland.  Representatives of the heads of all European states are living in tiny, frigid, wooden homes as they jockey for power and influence over the Czar.  When a man shows up claiming to be the Count Saint-Germain, the vampire must figure out how to protect his title and wealth without revealing either is true identity or his True Nature.




23. Burning Shadows (2009)
Two decades strong, the Saint-Germain cycle is one of the most compelling works of dark fantasy and horror of our age. Historically accurate, these deeply emotional novels have a devoted readership.

In Burning Shadows, Yarbro looks at the legendary Huns from the perspective of the people who faced the brunt of their attacks. The vampire Saint-Germain seeks sanctuary at an isolated monastery, unwilling to abandon the hundreds of terrified villagers he has led in flight from the Huns. A few Roman soldiers and some village Watchmen are the monastery’s defense force—and they are undermined by the religious fervor of some of the monks, who argue that since everyone’s fate is in God’s hands, it is foolish to defend themselves. In the hothouse atmosphere of the high-walled monastery, Saint-Germain must take special care when slaking his vampire thirst, for discovery of his True Nature will result in his True Death.


24. An Embarrassment of Riches - set in Bohemia, 1269-72

25. Commedia della Morte - set in France & Italy 1792-94.

Note that The Saint Germain Chronicles and The Saint Germain Memoirs are short story collections and not novels.

 
Related series:
 
Atta Olivia Clemens

A Flame in Byzantium (1987)



Atta Olivia Clemens, forced to leave Rome, journeys to the Constantinople of Justinian and discovers how much she has lost.*

















Crusader's Torch (1988)

Caught up in the hysteria of the Crusades, Olivia seeks to leave Tyre and return to Rome; this proves to be far more difficult than she had expected.*



















A Candle for D'Artagnan (1989)




Olivia Atta Clemens, immortal vampire, Roman noblewoman, beloved of the Count Saint-Germain-has come to Paris seeking only peace. But the year is 1637, and there is no peace to be found in the Court of Louis XIII, where Cardinal Richelieu maneuvers to control the throne.

Caught up in the intrigue against her will, Olivia seeks and wins the protection of a young guardsman named d'Artagnan-a man destined to become one of the greatest heroes of all time.






Madelaine de Montalia

Out of the House of Life (1990)


More than a third of Saint-Germain's long, long life was spent in the shadow of the Pyramids, in service to the temples of Egypt--but the tale of those years has never been told before.

In Out of the House of Life, readers of Yarbro's series can at last discover how a bloodthirsty demon, captured and enslaved by the high priests of the temple of Imhotep, was transformed into priest and physician and then, finally, into an immortal being of great power and greater wisdom.






In the Face of Death (2001)
This erotic and historical vampire novel is set in America in the years before and during the Civil War and features Madelaine de Montalia, sometime lover of Count St. Germain; General William Tecumseh Sherman; and, in a supporting role, St. Germain himself. Madelaine lives with and studies the native tribes of America, trying to document their culture and knowledge before they are changed unalterably by contact with the settlers new to North America, only to find herself in the middle of some of the most horrifying events of the war. The stubborn and highly disciplined Tecumseh wrestles with his conscience as he falls in love with Madelaine, while the strong-willed Madelaine is torn between her love for Tecumseh and the demands of her nature.


 
 
* From Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's website.

0 comments:

Post a Comment