What is it about vampire fiction (movies. books, etc) that makes women so sweaty and moist?

[Thudlow_Boink]

“When I was a kid, the boys liked stories about vampires, and the girls went ‘Eww’…” –Mallard Fillmore, in a very rare strip that I actually identified with rather than rolling my eyes or wanting to drop-kick the newspaper across the room.

[Anaamika]

Vampires aren’t my most favorite thing… I tend to prefer the jaded knight figure in fiction better. But another thing vampires have going for them is living outside the rules. That alone makes them interesting.

[salinqmind]

@lee

You know, sex is inherently dangerous for women. At best even having sex in a socally acceptable context risks pregnancy and possible death in childbirth or if you live, weight gain, aging, and a life of responsibility and messes. Vampires at least don’t lead to drudgery. For the right girl they lead to sex, perpetual youth, power, and never having to have dinner ready again, and the outfits are awesome. Vampires are also neat (most have OCD doncha know) and never throw their dirty socks under the bed. They are strong. They don’t scratch themselves while sitting in front of the television while watching football. Perhaps best of all, being seduced by a vampire means that you will not turn into your mother.

You said it better than my feeble attempt. This. This is it. Vampires aren’t dull, annoying, and disappointing like some mundane ‘real’ man.

I don’t know why anyone wonders about women and vampire novels, or women and romance novels. It’s not like women are going to stop reading what turns them on. Men have things like Megan Fox, movies about comic book heroes and toys, and a whole world of internet pornography to float their boats. Can’t women have their little private moments of fantasy with hot vampires, without anyone demanding to know WHY?

[Ichini_Sanshigo]

@Der_Trihs

Well, to quote myself from that thread:

Depending on how they are portrayed, vampires can be a male power fantasy as much as they can be a repressed-woman’s sexual fantasy. In fact, I think there’s at least three major vamp categories here; male power fantasy vampires, female romance/sex/danger fantasy vampires, and Just Plain Scary vampires. With a fair amount of overlap with the milder versions of course; but sparkly “emo” TwiVamps and monstrous, badass mastermind Kain of the Legacy of Kain games are wildly different in style.

Okay, but where do writers like Christine Feehan (Carpathians) and JR Ward (Black Dagger Brotherhood) fit in? These books feature the “female romance/sex/danger fantasy vampires”, but usually presented as Not!Evil, or Not!Vamps. For example, the Carpathians only become evil vamps after several hundred years of life without finding their soulmates. And the vamps of the BDB are simply presented as a different species from humans (one that happens to drink blood).

These series also feature “Just Plain Scary vampires”, in the form of action-adventure adversaries for the sex-interest/good-guy vamps. These bad guys are either hunters of or hunted by the good guy vamps.

Book series like these seem to straddle the line between romance and action. Authors like Feehan, Ward, Showalter, and others (there’s a slew of these) use all the typical features of romance novels, including the HEA, but also have a lot of over-the-top violence and fight scenes. Ward’s first book opens with a fiht scene and a car bomb, fer chrissakes).

So I think it’s a bit simplistic to say women like vamps b/c they want to be seduced by them. If anything, women want both the seduction and the power fantasy.

[Giles]

From TV Tropes: All Girls Want Bad Boys.