Shock horror

Darren Shan’s philosophy on books is that they must entertain, amaze and scare readers of all ages. The scare should always stay in your mind, long after you turn the final page….

Because of this philosophy, Darren Shan has become a master story teller. He has sold over 15 million copies of his books, in 31 languages in 39 countries! In fact, critics have called him “Hotter than Potter”.

One of my favourite authors, Darren Shan came to Sydney recently. I was happy to get a chance to go and say hello.

Darren Shan’s books

Darren Shan’s books have been my latest interest in the world of books. They are a vampire genre, and I find them to be interesting and captivating.

I like Darren Shan’s books because they are filled with suspense with some fantastic story lines. You can relate to his characters. The horror in his books is not like Scream 3 horror with bodies and blood and gore, but it’s more believable. You almost feel like you are there in every scene – Darren describes very well.

All the books are set in vampire culture. In his first series The Saga of Darren Shan, you learn all about the vampire world. There are good vampires and bad vampires. There is a vampire parliament which meets at Vampire Mountain. The leaders of the vampire world are Vampire Princes and Vampire Generals. The bad guys are Vampaneze. There is plenty of fighting between the good guys and the baddies.

The other series are the Demonata series, the City Trilogy and The Saga of Larten Crepsley

Darren’s career as a writer

Darren Shan’s real name is Darren O’Shaughnessy. He was born in 1972 in south east London. He studied Sociology and English at university.

Darren’s interest in creative writing began early. He bought his first typewriter when he was 14, making comic strips and short stories. He was 15 when he came second in a television-script-writing competition for a TV show in Ireland.

Darren finished his first novel when he was only 17. He loved the experience, and after university, his first book Cirque Du Freak was published.

Darren Shan in Sydney

Darren came to Sydney to release his latest book The Birth of a Killer . I went to see him at The Children’s Bookshop in Beecroft. He read a section from his upcoming book Ocean of Blood . He said it was his most horrific work so far, but he also said the book is really very positive. He read very dramatically. The scene was filled with cobwebs and blood and strange creatures – and the main character’s family members.

He also answered lots of questions. I was surprised to learn that for his first book Cirque du Freak , he received nearly twenty rejection letters from publishers! But he said, he believed in his work, and stuck with it. The book is now a movie. Someone asked Darren if he liked the movie, and he said yes, but I thought he was just being polite! (No, I didn’t like the movie myself!)

He also described how he bases his characters on people he knows. For example, the character who can put his tongue up his nose, is based on his own cousin who used to do the same.

Darren also described how he works. He said he is basically lazy, so he sets himself a target for a particular number of pages to write every day and makes sure to complete it.

Darren enjoyed watching horror and reading horror comics when he was younger. No wonder he loves writing horror the most. He also told us he loves watching movies: apparently he has a collection of over four thousand movies at home. He must have a good cataloguing system…

His other hobbies are watching football, listening to pop and rock music, theatre, worldwide travel, and eating - gourmet cuisine as well as junk food. Hmmm, same hobbies as mine… and of most boys of my own age: maybe that is why we like Darren as a writer.

In the audience, there were many ‘Shansters’ of my age, but also many people much older then me, like uni students.

Then we lined up to have our books signed by him. Some people had bags full of Darren Shan books. One man just ahead of me told Darren that the first book he ever read, was only recently, and it was a Darren Shan book. Now he loves reading.

Darren wrote a message for everyone. In my book he wrote: I hope you don’t end up eating cobwebs in a crypt!

I showed him my two English projects which I did last year based on his books. He asked if I got a good mark on them.

Yes I did - maybe my teacher was a fan of his too!