They’re vampires. They’re pirates. They’re Vampirates! Justin Somper’s genre-melding series of books have become a massive success with kids of all ages. Now Somper is back with a timber-shivering new instalment entitled Black Heart. He talks to Total Sci-Fi about cutthroat pirates and suck-throat vampires.

What can readers expect from your new novel, Black Heart? How does it differ from the previous instalments?

Expect the unexpected! I think in a way that though the Vampirates books are a sequence, each one has a different mood, perhaps because they combine a number of genres – adventure, fantasy, horror, comedy and – dare I say it - romance.

If Blood Captain was epic, Black Heart is more intimate. It answers a lot of questions about the history of the main characters, twins Grace and Connor Tempest and, excitingly, it’s stuff they are learning about themselves for the first time along with the readers. It’s also rather a demented love story – between King of the Vampirates, Sidorio, and the newest Vampirate Captain on the scene, the gorgeous but demented Lady Lola Lockwood. It’s my personal favourite of the episodes so far and I hope readers agree.

Where did the idea of fusing pirates and vampires come from initially?

It was something of a ‘Eureka!’ moment. The word just popped into my head one day. It all stemmed from that rather than a more conscious process. It was only afterwards that I began to look at the possibilities for combining pirate history and vampire myth. I knew I was onto something but I knew it was going to be hard work to get it right and live up to readers’ expectations.

Were any of the characters inspired by real people?

A number of the characters have been inspired by my research into real-life pirates. I found out, for instance, that as a young man Julius Caesar was kidnapped by pirates from Cilicia. Caesar tricked the pirates into releasing him and then put them to death. I’ve used that as Sidorio’s backstory. Cheng Li is inspired more loosely by a famous female Chinese pirate, Cheng I Sao.

At the other end of the spectrum, the character Jez Stukeley was originally inspired by a BBC TV presenter who interviewed me – he was never intended to be a major character but he is now! And I’ve just written a short story featuring three characters inspired by Australian friends of mine I was visiting at the time.

Are there any particular vampire or pirate novels that you would say have been particularly influential? Or any classic pirate movies?

Disappointingly, no. For the most part, I’ve avoided reading novels or watching movies within these two genres so as to avoid becoming overly influenced. Of course, I did borrow the title of the pirate movie Captain Blood and turn it on its head for one of my titles.

I’m about to break my policy and read Dead Until Dark, the inspiration for Trueblood. I figure that I can relax a bit more now I’m working on Book 5 in the sequence. I might even watch The Lost Boys at long last this year!

Are the books aimed at a particular age bracket?

The books were originally written with a core audience aged 10-14 in mind. That still holds and, although I push the envelope a bit, I wouldn’t include material in any future books that I thought was fundamentally inappropriate for that age-range. One of the beauties of the vampir(at)e genre is that it enables you to deal with many subjects in a coded way anyhow so there’s no great need to be overly explicit. I feel that the past couple of books have been a bit more sophisticated but that’s been an unconscious process.

I get fan mail from kids as young as seven, through to those in their late teens and indeed adults. There’s this whole controversy about age-ranging books at the moment – as far as I’m concerned, if you enjoy the Vampirates books, you ARE the right age for them.

So you haven’t consciously had to hold back on the gore to keep it family reading?

Actually no! In fact when I was writing the first book, my editor told me to let the blood spill a bit more liberally. I think I was being overly protective of both my readers and my characters. Happily, that’s changed and I think there’s a nice level of gore in Black Heart, especially with my new Vampirate Captain, Lady Lola Lockwood, who likes to drain her victims’ blood into wine bottles for drinking at leisure. She also enjoys bathing in blood.

Are you tempted to write an adult horror novel eventually?

I don’t have a particular ambition to write an adult horror novel any more than I did to create a sequence for young people. For me, it’s all about ideas. If I had an idea more suited to an adult audience, then I’d go for it, but right now I’m very happy working in this genre for this audience.

Do you think your background in PR helped you spot a gap in the market? Or were you shocked by the success of Demons of the Ocean?

As I said, the idea for Vampirates simply came from the word popping into my head. It wasn’t a clever or conscious ploy to tap into the success of franchises like Buffy/Angel or Pirates of the Caribbean.

In fact, when I had the idea, Pirates of the Caribbean was only a theme-park ride and pirates were considered the height of naff. However, I’ve certainly benefited from Pirates of the Caribbean being so high profile when my first book was published and latterly the renewed interest in vampires thanks to Twilight etc.

The truth is that although I think I’m quite good at PR, the writing comes from a very different place. It’s kind of like being Worzel Gummidge and switching heads. I find it hard to judge my own writing. I was genuinely surprised at the scale and speed of success of the books, especially the take-up by international publishers. I didn’t have much of an apprenticeship as a writer, which I sometimes think would have been helpful – but I’m not complaining!

We’ve heard that you’ve been asked to write three more novels in the series, plus a spin-off entitled Vampirates Crossing Stories. Can you tell us anything about those?

I’m currently under contract for two more Vampirates novels plus the Crossing Stories book. Originally, I planned to write four stories in the sequence but the publishers wanted more so I had a speedy rethink! I’m just starting work on Book 5 at the moment and the exciting thing for me is that the overarching idea still feels fresh and I think there is a lot further for the key characters to go. I hope readers agree!

So, although I know where Book 6 will end (and my lips are sealed), that may not be the end point of the sequence. Book 5 is shaping up into a very different book again to its predecessors, with the key characters interacting in new and intriguing ways.

The idea behind Crossing Stories came in response to fans wanting more background on the key vampirate characters – how they had crossed from mortality into the vampire realm, what their mortal lives were like etc. Originally, I was going to write it between Black Heart and Book 5 but I decided I wanted to get straight on with the next full novel first.

Can you say anything about the rumours of a movie version?

If Hollywood calls, I’m ready to do lunch… Seriously, there has been some interest but nothing compelling enough to take to the deal stage. I’m completely open as to what the Vampirates movie(s) could be but I suspect that it’s going to need a big old budget to do it justice. I’d very much like it to happen while Angelina Jolie could, if she wished to, play Lady Lola Lockwood.

Was it always your dream to be a writer growing up?

It was never my conscious dream to be a writer, but I have always written and always wanted to write. I think it was John Irving who said that if he’d been anything but a writer he’d have felt a vague sense of disappointment. That sums it up for me, too – it feels like what I should be doing.

Finally, do you have any advice for aspiring authors?

My advice to aspiring authors is threefold – 1) Read a lot and as widely as possible. 2) Write as often as you can and, again, keep experimenting until you know what’s right for you. 3) Grow a hard skin. Of the eight publishers who were originally offered Vampirates, four of them turned it down immediately. At times like that, you have to have self-belief and keep going.

Vampirates: Black Heart is out now from Simon & Schuster. Click here to read our review. Justin Somper photo by Matthew Venables.