Tag Archives : Deborah Harkness

With This Ring, You’ll Be Dead: Violence Against Female Protagonists in Romantic Vampire Fiction: Part 2: Seduction


Editor’s Note: content warning for violence, abuse, and potentially triggering subject matter. What is seduction? Most people would define it as something pleasant. A series of actions and behaviors performed by someone they find attractive to make them even more alluring. However, if we examine the actual definition of seduction, it’s a bit more sinister than that. Merriam-Webster defines seduction…

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With This Ring, You’ll Be Dead: Violence Against Female Protagonists in Romantic Vampire Fiction: Part 1: Stalking


Editor’s Note: content warning for violence, abuse, and potentially triggering subject matter. I’ve consumed a lot of vampire fiction in the past thirty-five years. In fact, I often think of my consumption of vampire fiction — novels, short stories, comics, movies, TV shows, etc. — as vampiric in and of itself. To say that I am obsessed would be an…

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The Kasturi/Files: Episodes 15 & 16: Spec Chic Smackdown! The Covenant vs The Craft!


It’s the Ides of October! The very hinge of the month! Welcome to Days 15 and 16 of The Kasturi/Files here at Speculative Chic! It’s a double-episode Spook-tacular! A Spec Chic SMACKDOWN! Could we use more exclamation points? Yes!!!! We’re basically halfway through the month, and on a roll. To have some fun, we thought we’d revisit a couple of,…

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White Privilege in A Discovery of Witches, It Isn’t Just for the Living Anymore


Welcome to the first post in a series in which I will be examining vampire fiction — novels, film, and TV shows — through the lens of identity politics. Specifically, I’ll be looking at the concepts of white privilege and racial identity/representation in popular vampire fiction and discussing why certain tropes are problematic. As a woman of color who has…

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