Ah, vampires. One of my favourite paranormal romance characters, and one that is easy to combine with other character tropes to create bloodsuckers with interesting backgrounds and attitude.

Classics include domineering alpha vampires, vampire dukes, vampire kings, the ever-popular vampire billionaire (because when you live forever, you're bound to acrew quite the padded bank account), and, of course, the vampire bad boy.

And while you'll see some of these classic vampire trope combos in today's Halloween-inspired romance writing prompts, I've also included a few wild cards—vampire lumberjacks and firefighters. Because there's nothing I like more than taking a trope and spinning it on its head. And if you think about it, vampires would make great firefighters; they don't have to worry about risking their lives when they run into the blaze.

1. Tropes: Workplace romance, forbidden romance

   Setting: Halloween party at a publishing company in London

   Main character 1: Vampire boss

   Main character 2: Newly hired secretary and part-time writer

   Prompt: Write the scene, from MC1's point of view, when he approaches MC2, who is lingering over the punch bowl, and, after a few lines of stilted dialogue, they gushing about their favourite authors—and MC1 realizes that he's in dangerous territory (flirting with a human).
   

2. Tropes: Fated mates

   Setting: Dead Souls Day party in Gilded Age New York

   Main character 1: Vampire duke

   Main character 2: Wallflower heroine

   Prompt: Write the scene, from MC2's point of view, when she and MC1 share a passionate kiss in the house's library, and she gets the shock of her life when that fated mate feeling hits.
   

3. Tropes: Grumpy/sunshine

   Setting: Cairngorms mountains in Scotland

   Main character 1: Mountain man vampire

   Main character 2: Runaway bride, heiress

   Prompt: Write the scene when MC1 walks into his cabin to find MC2 asleep on his couch, still in her bride-of-Dracula-themed wedding dress.
   

4. Tropes: Bang it out of our systems, roommates

   Setting: Halloween house party

   Main character 1: Celibate vampire

   Main character 2: Cam girl heroine

   Prompt: Write the scene when MC1, trying to escape the party guests flooding into his house, walks into MC2's room and catches her in the middle of camming.
   

5. Tropes: Virgin auction, second chance, the one that got away

   Setting: Halloween party at private club

   Main character 1: Mafia vampire

   Main character 2: Virgin heroine

   Prompt: Write the scene when MC1, who broke up with MC2 to protect her, sees her walk on stage and hears the high bids the criminals around him start calling out.

I'll be back next week with a slew of paranormal witch romance story starters, so stay tuned! Until next post, happy reading and writing!