Many Bloody Returns

Charlaine Harris (the Sookie Stackhouse novels) and Toni L.P. Kelner (the Laura Fleming mysteries) have gathered together another 11 writers with serious vamp credentials to provide a baker's dozen tales.

Meet Sookie Stackhouse, who, as the only non-vampire at a 'Dracula's birthday ball' soon finds that's she's the one on the menu, and Harry Dresden, who drops by a role-playing game to find himself dealing with deadly party crashers.

In P.N. Elrod's 'Grave-Robbed', which mixes pathos and comedy, vampire PI Jack Fleming busts a phony medium mid-s ance

Tanya Huff's 'Blood Wrapped' has Henry Fitzroy searching for the ideal gift for a vampire's 40th mixing with his pursuit of a human kidnapper.

And Christopher Golden takes birthdays to heart in his poignant coming-of-age story 'The Mournful Cry of Owls'.