From VBC/ Chelsea: Heather Long’s Single Wicked Wolf released earlier this month. The VBC team has a thing for shifters, as you likely know, and the latest in her Wolves of Willow Bend series. The next book, Desert Wolf, comes out Nov. 24. She’s clearly busy writing lots of paranormal romance goodness, but we snagged Heather to tell us about why we love these supernatural alpha males.
True confession time. Most males, real or imagined, who know how sexy and attractive they are don’t typically strike me as either sexy or attractive. Too often, they come across as arrogant or entitled. So, I had to ask myself—is that because they are arrogant? Do good looks, attractiveness and awareness equal a narcissistic personality? Is it possible to be that good looking, that aware, and not be shallow or a douche?
Sexy Beasts
The first time someone asked me the question vampires versus werewolves, which is your preference? I have to admit: I said neither. Why, you might ask? Well the best-known vampires at the time were Anne Rice’s luscious Lestat and her moody Louis and sorry, Lestat was such a brat and Louis whined way too much. The biggest “wolves” I knew at the time were from the horror movie, The Howling or Michael J. Fox in Teen Wolf (sorry folks seeing Alex P. Keaton turn into a teddy bear—I mean wolf—didn’t leave me keen on either—except for one small little thing (remember, I said True Confession here) there was this series with Simon MacCorkindale in the 80s called Manimal—I LOVED me some Manimal.
It might be good to point out that I grew up loving The Jungle Book—both the Disney film and the original book by Rudyard Kipling. In the book, Mowgli was raised by wolves. I loved the Tarzan mythos, too. He was raised by apes. Then there are of course all the fables that I read about animals talking and becoming people or people who became animals. I think my shifter love was long established.
My First Vampire Love
It was Companions that drew me to Mercedes Lackey. I still have my original copies of Arrows of the Queen and the Vanyel trilogy. Always a huge fan of Mercedes Lackey, I became even more when she launched her Diana Tregarde books back in 1990, Andre sort of turned me around on the vampire thing. I loved the idea of wolves as shifters, but I was still hungry to find the right shifter series that gave me that Manimal vibe. I also wanted a series or a book that fed into my understanding of wolf sociology, and wolf pack dynamics.
I’ve always had pets, dogs, cats, ferrets, and horses. How these animals interact within their own species is unique and specific to their species. Dogs always have a “top” dog or “Alpha.” They always have someone who falls just on the outside of the hierarchy and someone who falls on the bottom. Every time someone new enters they have to re-establish their pecking order in some way.
That said, in 1991 a new series kicked off that immediately captivated my interest—The Vampire Diaries by L.J. Smith—in that series, Damon Salvatore was always my favorite. Not only was he a sexy Italian vampire bad boy, but he could also become a wolf. Yep, talk about the best of both worlds!
Over the years, I’ve fallen in love with plenty of series. Vampires are there and some I love and some I don’t, but the wolves? They draw me back time and again. Wolves are romantic and their sexy and though at times driven by their animalism, they are loyal and infinitely protective. So at the end of the day whether it’s Patricia Briggs with Adam, Sam, Charles and Bran, the early Laurell K. Hamilton with Richard, or Nalini Singh with Hawke, Andrew, and my personal favorite, Riley—just to name a few—I’ll always be something for a wolf girl.
So to answer my earlier question, yes, a man can be devastatingly attractive and know it and still be so much more—especially if he’s a wolf.
Yep. I still reread my Valdemar books and love Patricia Briggs wolves. Must admit I’m a Hawke girl and I adore your wolves.