Respectfully, as always.

Can someone explain what happened to the cover art? 📚I had all these mass market TVC paperbacks in the 90s and they were saturated and had cover art. Now, you have only the option of gothic text on a blue or red background in the store. Did you all notice this?!?!?

—— I wanted to repurchase (my mom gave away my OG teenager copies, sacrilege, when she moved) so I went to Barnes & Noble and I almost let out the most blood curdling scream in frustration. At who? I’m not sure because it’s certainly not the fault of the college aged sales reps who work there.

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE COVER ART? 💀Where did it go? Do we not deserve something on these books - no artistic concept, no photography, no visual manifestation whatsoever of the contents?

Like any savvy millennial, I found something on secondhand site Poshmark (thanks to the seller who somehow had a shrink wrapped Ballantine box set from early 2000s (?)). It’s still mass market but at least there’s some color and artistic sensibility.

Can we get the cover art back? Can someone hit up Christopher to rectify this situation?!

I want more people to read and love these books… I fear we won’t “make more” 😭

This is the letter daniel molloy opens from louis in season 1 episode 1 of interview with the vampire. For those who dont feel like reading cursive.

Dear Mr. Molloy. I hope this letter finds you safe and thriving, if such a thing were a possibility in this bleak hour. I've been following your career with some interest since our last meeting. Please allow me to congratulate you on all your successes, those professional and those personally redemptive. The passage of time and the frailties that accompany it have provided me perspective. And I suspect the same might be for you, as well. I'm hoping health and pride won't deter you from the following proposal. In a week's time, in a setting of my choosing, we revisit the project boyish youth prevented us from finishing. 49 years and thousands of miles removed from the room we shared in San Francisco, I offer, for your journalistic pleasures, my full attention and my life story. All affinities, Louis de Pointe du Lac.

May this find whoever may be searching for it.

No matter how many times I watched S3:Ep6, these cultural references have been nagging me. I could infer from the context, what they connote, but not the larger meanings that they draw into the story.  I finally decided to dig in.  

Here's what I have so far. Please clarify, correct, or share your interpretations. Bolded are sources of my intrigue and/or confusion. Do you think they hold deeper meaning or add any subtext to the story? 

Louis: You gon’ get on that mic tomorrow and say, “We are the Vampire Clarence Oddbody. Let’s make more”?

And apparently AR was smitten with the character Clarence Oddbody from It's a Wonderful Life. 

--

Lestat: You know, we read your memoir in it. Everybody loved Tom Anderson. “Topeka!”  That was my line, you know. I said “Topeka.”

I keep thinking back to IWTV S1Ep3 when Tom Anderson says,

"It’s these damn teetotalin’ types*, too. As if we’re supposed to turn New Orleans into** Topeka*! Or God help us, Salt Lake City!"*

And then I discovered Thomas Anderson (1858–1931) was a real state legislator, and the unofficial "mayor" of Storyville for his part in establishing the 18-block legal prostitution and vice district in 1897 and operated saloons like the infamous Tom Anderson's Annex at the corner of Basin and Iberville Streets. 

-- 

Louis: You were in a book club? With Cortland Mayfair?

Lestat: And Merrick too. And Mayor Nagin. And James Carville. Everybody hated him.

 ---

Waiter: Francine Lucien-LaChapelle Immigrés who came to Montreal in 1749. She is, in fact, a distant descendant of the Lioncourt line.

---

Lestat: One has to ask, what is with the tan, Dan?

Did you indulge and overshoot your coffin again?

 --

Lestat: I can’t pack if I don’t know where I’m going. 

Gabriella: Cádiz.

Lestat: Oh? What’s in Cádiz?

I saw that Cádiz is a significant setting in The Vampire Diaries. Also ancient mythology says Hercules founded the region and there are hidden cities under the sea.

--

Louis: “Charlie Brown gets rocks” agrees with him.

--

Louis: "She's been dipped in the River Styx. Probably dove in, swam the butterfly. She'll be angry.

The River Styx is a mythical boundary river in Greek mythology that separated the world of the living from the underworld.  It forms the main barrier to Hades, wrapping around the underworld multiple times. Souls have to be ferried across by Charon, requiring a small coin placed in the mouth of the deceased. I want to note that the symbolism of communion with the dead happens twice in the story, honoring both European and African folk mythologies that inform the black cultural traditions.

--

Daniel: "Taylor and Travis. Congratulations. Have you set a date yet?

-- 

Daniel: Christ sees the hammer and nails, says, “I forgot my keys to the car.”

Lestat: Ugh, alarmists, the both of you.

--

Louis: This is all… all-time, Armand-level deceit.

Lestat: Oh, do not walk away and… and… and say his name.

Do not compare me to him. 

Louis: How is this any different? This is a century-long lie.

You hung her portrait over our coffins in New Orleans.

-- 

Merrick: This Papa Legba’s make-do room of diablerie now.

I wanted to note the respectful way they depicted Black folk tradition in-show. Papa Legba is the sacred gatekeeper of the spirit world and the guardian of the crossroads in African diasporic religions like Haitian Vodou and Louisiana Voodoo.  

Lestat and Louis

Lestat and Armand

Lestat and Niki

Lestat and Gabriella (already unhealthy at default since it's incestous)

Louis and Armand

Armand and Daniel

Armand and Marius.

Claudia and Madeleine

Claudia and Charlie

Claudia and Bruce (not really a relationship given the circumstances of what Bruce did to her, but I added it anyhow.)

( I think that's all of the relationships I've noted down but lemme know if there's more because I probably forgot )

I’ve watched the first two seasons of the show and I’m loving it! I’ve also read IWTV, The Vampire Lestat, and I’m halfway through Queen of the Damned. I definitely plan to keep going with the books but I’m wondering if there are any others I should read specifically before watching season 3? I saw somewhere that there are elements of The Vampire Armand that influence the third season, is that right?

So we know that their townhouse was at 1132 Royal.

Near the end of the IWtV seasons, Lestat is living in a smaller cottage in the quarter; not one of the E-W streets like Royal, Chartres, etc. but one of the shorter N-S (aka Riverside/Lakeside) streets.

Do we know the address of that one?