Twilight-based office vampire romance gets book deal

Two fans of the "Twilight Saga" who rewrote the vampire love story as a steamy office romance have scored a two-book deal with a New York publisher in a fresh example of fanfiction going mainstream. Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon and Schuster, confirmed Thursday a report in The Hollywood Reporter that it will publish "The Office" -- no relation to the Ricky Gervais television series -- plus a sequel next year. News of the deal precedes the November 15 release of "Breaking Dawn," the fifth and final installment of the blockbuster movie franchise based on American author Stephenie Meyer's best-selling fantasy novels. Written by Christina Hobbs and Lauren Billings, "The Office" was among the first works of fanfiction to riff off the Twilight narrative, generating more than two million downloads. It reimagines vampire Edward Cullen and the teenager who loves him, Bella Swan, as a boss and his assistant in a love-hate melodrama set in an office far removed from the moody Pacific Northwest of Meyer's original tale. A spokeswoman for Gallery Books told AFP that "The Office" would come out in February as an ebook and paperback under the title "Beautiful Bastard," followed three months later with an original sequel, "Beautiful Stranger." Both will appear under the authors' new pen name Christina Lauren. Fanfiction, or amateur online literature, hit it big time earlier this year when the edgy erotic trilogy "Fifty Shades of Grey" by British author E.L. James crossed over into print, dominating the best-seller lists. One website dedicated to Twilight fanfiction, Twilighted.net, has so far turned out 6,414 stories by 3,237 authors totaling 48,201 chapters.