Balancing Blood and Gore

I could easily open a vein and let blood, gore and vampyric violence pour out of me for page after page after page. But I don't. I hold back and here's why: while people may not bat an eye at the really bloody scenes, they will demand reason for them. After all, you can't write a book about the act of acquiring sustenance (just imagine 240 pages about some guy eating a cheeseburger. *snore*) and, what it boils down to is that vampires have to eat. Oh sure, they may enjoy it with a profound sense of power or an overwhelming sense of lust, but the reason they're drinking blood or ripping flesh from bone...well, it comes down to getting their vitamins and basic nutrients.

Let's go back to the cheeseburger analogy.

If your entire book is about how a guy gets a cheeseburger, what it smells like, tastes like, how the grease feels as it runs down his chin, how the burger tastes and, finally, how satisfying it is to consume it...well, there's just not much of a story there. But put your guy in the desert for a week, where he falls for mirage after mystifying mirage until he finally stumbles on a burger joint, but the waitress turns out to be an ex-lover of his and he suspects she's to blame for his unscheduled trip to the desert in the first place...you might have something there when coupled with his enjoyment of that cheeseburger.

I've read so many short stories that are indeed short, but lack the basic "story" element. I try to avoid focusing on the blood, but it's a challenge, to be sure. So when I write, enjoying the gory scenes as much as I do, I use them as treats for having written well-thought-out plot leading up to that point. I reward myself with blood, slick muscle tissue and veins the way some might reward their efforts with chocolate.

It works for me.