In which I am entirely too negative.

[barbarienne]

Let's start with this, from this morning's Lunch Weekly:
Sarah Gray's WUTHERING BITES, a retelling of Wuthering Heights in which Heathcliff is a vampire, to John Scognamiglio at Kensington, in a very nice deal, for publication in September 2010, by Evan Marshall at Evan Marshall Agency (World).
For those who don't know Publisher's Lunch codes, "very

Comments

[kouaidou]

IMO this is dependent on whether the version of "vampire" they're using is the sexy sexy shiny Brad Pitt kind, or a beastly, festering Max Schreck Nosferatu. The latter could actually make it slightly interesting, but I bet they're going with the former.

[barbarienne]

Yes, that's a point. But since Heathcliff is the vampire, I'm betting on the sexy kind.

Heathcliff is in many ways the antecedent of the modern angsty-bad-boy vampire, and certainly a precursor of the "abusive boyfriends are cool!" scenario that informs Twilight and similar stories. Making him a vampire is not particularly creative, unless the author does something spectacular.

[kouaidou]

Yeah that's kind of what I was thinking when I first read the premise. "Heathcliff is a vampire? And this changes... what now?"

[raecarson]

I feel so condescended to. Like I'm stupid enough to pick GIMMICK over content.

And that's a totally unfair pre-supposition on my part, but I am weary of seeing this.

[dsgood]

The publishers will probably keep buying such books till a bit after the market for them collapses.

Offhand, I think something a bit newer would be more profitable. Sexy zombies, for example.

Or Dracula with Jane Austen characters inserted?

[wuwt]

Oedipus Bites might be interesting though...

[barbarienne]

LOL!