If you wish to support Michael in his quest to win the award, and would like to vote, you can do so by visiting www.albertareaderschoice.ca , selecting Cinco de Mayo
and pushing vote. You are allowed to vote once every 24 hours from any IP address. Once you have voted, please tweet “Viva Cinco de Mayo! I voted for it. Join all of us in supporting Cinco – a book for the people of the world!" When we see that, we will know that your vote came from this blog post. CONTEST: One lucky person who posts a question in the comments section will win a signed copy of Cinco de Mayo, sent out at the end of the month. Be certain to include your contact information.
They’re all vampire stories
by Michael J. Martineck
I’m thrilled Patricia’s letting me guest blog - despite the fact that my novel, Cinco de Mayo, hosts no undead – as it gives me the chance to discuss my belief that vampires remain constant in literature because . . . all writers are vampires.
In Cinco de Mayo everyone in the world is suddenly and inexplicably paired with someone else on the planet. Each person receives a full dose of the other’s memories. When asked, people recall two names, two first kisses, two complete lives. The novel follows several pairs as they deal with the new-found intimacy, or try to stay alive. Some people have learned a bit too much.
To write a novel that spans the globe, I had to feed on people I’ve known over the years, friends and acquaintances from across the world. I felt like a vampire, sucking out experiences, feelings, emotions, most of the time from unwitting victims. Hell, I was frequently unwitting. I collected pieces of people’s lives long before I knew I would write this book. I’m betting a lot of writers prey on people they know, overhear on the bus or observe, in a dim restaurant, through the corner of the eye.
This novel is hard to classify – a shot of science fiction, some paranormal, the pace of a thriller – in the end, all novels are the same. They’ve all vampire stories, as written by vampiric writers.
About the book
Cinco de Mayo tells the powerful tales of individuals around the world and their “others”:
A transit worker whose sudden knowledge of one of the leaders of the Aryan nation marks him for death.
A rich playboy from Abu Dhabi who vows to save his “other”, a child slave in a carpet factory in India.
A New York advertising executive who suddenly gets a new view on his own life through the eyes of a blind railroad worker in China.
An abused housewife who suddenly has the skills and knowledge of a Swiss Air Marshall.
There is a Cinco de Mayo story for everyone, a character in this book that you care about, maybe even love…a life that speaks to you and touches your heart.
No matter where you may be…
(Berkley, 2008).
Berkley, June 2009
by Freda Warrington (Severn House Publishers will be coming out December 1, 2009.
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and 
by Jaye Wells.
