Some books are labors of love. This is a labor of hate. It is born of hate for a certain turgid, tedious, verbose series of paranormal romance novels involving alleged vampires that just happen to sparkle in the sun like glitter instead of burning properly like torches.

Well I am applying the torches, pitchforks, and nice, sharp pointy wooden stakes of parody to this glaring, one might even say sparkling, problem.

And the means of delivery? A simple, innocuous novella.

Welcome to the romance between Rubella Duckling, a mortal girl so ordinary, weak, and lacking in a personality of her own that her perspective can fit comfortably around any sufficiently limited imagination, like a pair of pants, and Deadward Sullen, an ancient vampire stuck in his 100th year of high school because he can't quite seem to pass biology class.

FAQ:

Q) So why fund this project?

A) The Twilight series is richly deserving of a parody done by a properly disgruntled indie author as opposed to, say, the well heeled fancy lads at National Lampoon.

A) Reading my parody will be a better use of time than the original. Trust me. The entire novella will come in at around 30,000 words, which is fewer than Stephenie Meyer squanders on any particular passage describing how hot Bella thinks Edward is.

A) I certify my book will be 100% free of Mary Sue characters.

A) Unlike Meyer, I do not feel the need to molest and misuse a thesaurus.

A) If my story gets 95% of the way through and then pulls out an ending having almost nothing to do with what came before, I can blame it on the series I am parodying.

Q) Why do you hate Twilight so much?

A) For the first few years, actually I didn't. My lack of hatred was the result of lack of knowledge, as I was one of the few geeks who somehow managed to tune out the Twilight mania around me. Ignorance truly was bliss. Based on the exceptionally minimal attention I paid, I thought it was just another "sexy vampire" story ripping off Anne Rice, or perhaps yet another werewolves vs. vampires tale ripping off White Wolf Publishing.

But then I found out the vampires sparkled.

Sparkled? EFFING SPARKLED!?!?

From that moment was born a painful need, like an addiction to being tased. I was driven to find out more about the books. With each new piece of knowledge, and each hour wasted, my hatred grew like a poison flower blooming from a putrid seed planted in the rotting carcass of an innocent abused dictionary.

Q) Do you hate all paranormal romance, or just Twilight?

A) Just Twilight. The genre arguably goes back at least as far as Bram Stoker, or perhaps even folk tales of mortals and the fey. Certainly it can be traced in its full modern form to the immensely talented Anne Rice. There have been and continue to be a lot of good books written featuring the loves of mortals and supernatural beings, I just don't think that Twilight, however well it sells, is among them.

Q) You mentioned cheesy fangs among the rewards, but you know Twilight vampires don't have fangs, right?

A) Don't remind me. In any case, like I care! Twitlight vampires DO have fangs. Fake-looking ones like the kind you can buy for kid's Dracula costumes, except attached, and sparkly.

Q) This project is a book. Can you really complete it in three weeks?

A) Yep. I write in spurts of intense activity rather than in any remotely balanced measured way. My first novel, Alien Empire was 123,000 words, and I finished the first draft in a month. My second, Blood on Bronze, was 60,000, and I completed it in a week and a half (mind you, that was about all I did during that time). My third, Jamaica Rum, was also around 60,000 and took four weeks.