Many Bloody Returns: Tales of Birthdays with Bite » (Reprint)

Born and raised in the Mississippi Delta, Charlaine Harris is best known for her paranormal mysteries -- a sly, wry blend of humor, horror, that has been called "cozies with teeth."

"Clever...entertaining... excellent"(Library Journal) original vampire stories by Charlaine Harris, Jim Butcher, Kelley Armstrong, and more.

From cakes to stakes, a celebration of everyone's favorite bloodsucking subculture by a baker's dozen of favorite authors. Each of these thirteen original stories offers a fresh and unique take on what birthdays mean to the undead. From Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse attending a birthday party for Dracula to Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden battling bloodsucking party crashers, these suspenseful, surprising, sometimes dark, sometimes humorous stories will ensure paranormal fans will never think of vampires or birthdays quite the same again.

Publishers Weekly

This patchwork anthology of 13 new vampire stories proves that heavyweight contributors can give some substance to a relatively slight theme. Harris (the Sookie Stackhouse novels), Kelner (the Laura Fleming mysteries) and 11 other writers with serious vamp credentials craft stories around the concept of birthdays for bloodsuckers. Most of the tales only blow out candles in passing, as with P.N. Elrod's "Grave-Robbed," which mixes pathos and comedy as vampire PI Jack Fleming busts a phony medium mid-séance, and Tanya Huff's "Blood Wrapped," in which Henry Fitzroy's search for the ideal gift for a vampire's 40th mixes with his pursuit of a human kidnapper. Christopher Golden takes birthdays to heart in his poignant coming-of-age story, "The Mournful Cry of Owls," while Kelley Armstrong proposes in "Twilight" that a vampire's real birthday is the date of transformation from mortal to immortal. Fans of the many series vampires on parade here will be undeterred by the variable quality of their adventures. (Sept.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

Introduction: A Few Words by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner
Dracula Night by Charlaine Harris
The Mournful Cry of Owls by Christopher Golden
I Was a Teenage Vampire by Bill Crider
Twilight by Kelley Armstrong
It's My Birthday Too by Jim Butcher
Grave-Robbed by P.N. Elrod
The First Day of the Rest of Your Life by Rachel Caine
The Witch and the Wicked by Jeanne C. Stein
Blood Wrapped by Tanya Huff
The Wish by Carolyn Haines
Fire and Ice and Linguini for Two by Tate Hallaway
Vampire Hours by Elaine Viets
How Stella Got Her Grave Back by Toni L.P. Kelner