“According to the date on Van’s driver’s license, he was seventeen. Somehow he’d looked a lot older when he’d been trying to cut my head off.”

“You can’t hurt him. He’s an endangered species!” “Vampires are not endangered.” Van’s tone made it clear that it was his life’s work to rectify this regrettable situation. “No, not that,” Zack said dismissively. “He’s a Victorian!” “Brainwashed,” Van muttered. “Crazy,” Sarah proclaimed. “Steampunk,” I corrected with a sigh.”

“We both looked down at the stake through my heart. Funny. I would have thought that should hurt more. From the look on the vampire hunter’s face, he thought it should hurt more too.”

“I was a vampire, and... someone was trying to call me?When my parents had said that not even death could pry me from my mobile phone, I'd thought they were joking. I wriggled around in the narrow coffin until I could reach the ringing handset.”

“And then he did move, because my hardcover copy of Breaking Dawn whacked him full in the face, with all my vampiric strength propelling it.”

“I stared hard at the sheep, trying to see if I could view the movement of its blood through its skin, or sense the beating of its heart, or see the aura of its warmth glowing against the night. It stared back at me, looking resolutely like an ordinary sheep. I guess I wasn’t that sort of vampire. Or maybe sheep didn’t have auras.”

“The next evening found me having breakfast with a ridiculously hot guy. It was typical of my life that this would only happen when said guy was tied up.”