Dark Inspirations

We get asked a lot about how we came up with Lumeer and its people. A lot of our inspiration came from old Eastern European folklore which can be a little scary but we also find it fascinating. One story in particular that captured us, was about infants born with a Caul or Face Veil. A Caul is a membrane that covers the infants face or head at birth and is incredibly rare. It doesn’t harm the baby and is easily removed, but where’s the fun in leaving it at that, right?

Now, most legends have that a baby, born with a Caul was a sign of good luck and that a child born with a Caul cannot drown. This prompted savvy mothers to save the Caul and sell bits of it off to sailors, who would pay hefty prices for the powerful talisman… and they all lived happily ever after.

Then there is the darker legend - which of course is the one we like the best! This lore hails from Croatia and some Slovenian areas. This version states that a baby born with a Caul would either become a Kresnik (protector and all round good guy/gal) or a Kudlak (evil blood sucking toss). It was said that a clear or white Caul indicated the child would become Kresnik, but a red or dark Caul meant they would become a Kudlak. If there was ever conjecture about the Cauls’ colour, the midwife would run to the window and shout: "A kresnik is born! A kresnik!" hoping to sway fate. Here’s where it gets a little eewwwww…. It was believed that the kudlak was most dangerous after death because he or she would then become a vampire. So, to hamper the vampires’ return, the people would either impale the corpse on a stake or slash the tendon below the knees before burial. Ergh, as if death followed quickly by turning into a vamp wasn’t bad enough!

 

 

 

 

The R Word

Way back when Enlightened was just a crazy idea, and we hadn’t even typed our first word, Sair insisted – quite fervently that the story was an Urban Fantasy/Fantasy Fiction/Science Fiction/horror/Paranormal suspense. She was happy for it to sit under any of these genres however, under no circumstances, was Enlightened ever to be described as a Paranormal Romance. Jen has spent the last several years trying to convince her otherwise – Jen is crap at convincing people of anything.

Recently Sair helped out behind the scenes at the Cairns Tropical Writers festival where - thank Daska – she had the opportunity to meet the award winning Romance Author, Anna Campbell.

The timing of this meeting was fortuitous as the girls had been debating the genre of their series, given the impending release of number two. Jen argued that they had given Urban Fantasy/Fantasy Fiction/Science Fiction/horror/paranormal suspense a good run and it was time to open the story up to a new audience. Sair – being the horror buff that she is, stumbled over the R word and argued that putting the books under the Romance genre was limiting their audience.

This dilemma was foremost in Sair’s mind when she had the opportunity to steal five minutes of Anna Campbell’s time, so she posed the question to Anna. After Sair gave her a brief explanation of the story, Anna had Sair confess that the story was in fact a Paranormal Romance, hence the only place for the Enlightened series was the Paranormal Romance genre and we shouldn’t confuse people by putting it elsewhere. It is what it is and we need to embrace it. The clouds then parted and angel song was heard (slight exaggeration). Anna had managed to do in five minutes what Jen had failed to do in over five years. Enlightened finally became a Paranormal Romance!

Anna Campbell… Jen totally owes you a glass of something bubbly.