The film-makers are piggybacking off the success of the Twilight saga, which has sparked a renewed enthusiasm among financiers for gothic romance; the Brontes in particular. Wuthering Heights is one of Twilight heroine Bella Swan's favourite books, frequently referenced in the third episode Eclipse, whose storyline is inspired by Emily Bronte's only novel.

The producers of the latest Bronte projects are targeting the Twilight audience with younger casts than previous versions and scripts that emphasise the sensational gothic elements alongside a contemporary psychological realism.

Wuthering Heights, directed by Peter Webber, will star 22-year-old Ed Westwick, a British actor best known from the American teen TV series Gossip Girl, as an unusually youthful Heathcliff. Gemma Arterton, 23, will play Cathy.

Jane Eyre, meanwhile, will be directed by Cary Fukunaga who, in the pursuit of authenticity on his last film Sin Nombre, got arrested for riding illegally on the roof of a cargo train. Jane Eyre stars the 20-year-old Mia Wasikowska, soon to be seen in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, opposite Michael Fassbender as Mr Rochester (who was at one point lined up for Heathcliff in the other film).

"There was a different ending to 'New Moon.' Originally it was much quieter [and took place] in Bella's head," she said. Meyer changed it at the urging of her mom, Candy Morgan. She introduced the Volturi earlier, and — voila! — a Volturi smack-down jazzes up the end. Thanks, Candy.

Otherwise, Oprah and Meyer went over very familiar territory: "Twilight" came to Meyer in a dream; she imagined a hot vampire who was in love with a mortal girl; she wanted to know more; that dream became Chapter 13 of "Twilight." "In the dream it was two people in a circular meadow and one of them was a sparkly boy and one was just a girl who was human and normal and the boy was a vampire, which was bizarre," Meyer said. "It was a passion and frenzy when I started writing."

And of course, there was a question about Robert Pattinson. His hygiene having often been called into question, Oprah wanted to know, "What does he smell like?" "He smells great," Meyer said. "Rob is hilarious. He is the funniest person. He's not at all like the Edward character. He's so different. He just doesn't look like anyone else, in a good way. He's very striking looking."

"Love the Twilight books? Then you'll adore Wuthering Heights, one of the greatest love stories ever told," gushes the book chain's synopsis of Emily Brontë's novel. "Cathy and Heathcliff, childhood friends, are cruelly separated by class, fate and the actions of others. But uniting them is something even stronger: an all-consuming passion that sweeps away everything that comes between them. Even death!"

Meyer's human heroine Bella and her vampire hero Edward cite the 1847 novel as their favourite book; Bella even quotes Cathy speaking about Heathcliff, saying of Edward that "if all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger".

Just as Cathy is torn between Edgar and Heathcliff, so is Bella the centre of a love triangle between Edward and Jacob the werewolf.

"Wuthering Heights is of course a steady seller, but it's usually Pride and Prejudice, or whichever classic has recently been adapted for film or TV that is at the top. I don't think a vampire's recommendation has ever sent a book to number one before," said Waterstone's classics buyer Simon Robertson.

The Twilight author has been served with a "cease and desist" order sent to her publisher, Hachette Book Group USA, by lawyers acting for Jordan Scott. The letter claims that the latest volume in Meyer's Twilight series, Breaking Dawn, which was published last year, "shows a striking and substantial similarity" to Scott's book The Nocturne, and asks the publisher how it intends "to cease and desist from any further copyright infringement and to compensate my client for her damages". Hachette called the claim "completely without merit" and said that any lawsuit would be "defended vigorously".

Scott's lawyer, J Craig Williams, claims that Scott's book was published and posted on the internet in 2006 and cites similarities. Among these are that both books include an after-wedding sex scene on a beach, that both contain a scene about a woman who is sick because she's pregnant with a child with evil powers, that both feature a scene in which the pregnant wife is dying, that both include a scene in which the main character sees their baby for the first time, and that both see the main character turn into a vampire. Scott also points out that in both books the main character refers to his wife as "love".

The Breaking Dawn special edition will feature a DVD of the Breaking Dawn Concert Series, including a performance by Blue October's Justin Furstenfeld and conversation between author Stephenie Meyer and Furstenfeld. LB is printing "only" one million copies of this edition; it goes on sale August 4 for $24.99. Also that day, the publisher will release a trade paperback edition of Eclipse, the third book in the series.

The $24.99 journals set consists of four journals packaged in a tin, and will go on sale October 13. In addition to the mass market tie-in edition of New Moon, LB will also release New Moon Collector's Edition, slipcased with a ribbon bookmark and cloth cover, for $30; and New Moon: The Complete Illustrated Movie Companion for $18.99, both on October 6.

It didn’t hit Harry Potter numbers, but Hachette Book Group USA estimated that it sold 1.3 million copies of Breaking Dawn, on August 2, the day the eagerly awaited final novel in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight Saga was released. The figure is a record first-day sales performance for an Hachette book. To meet the strong demand, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers went back to press for a second printing of 500,000 copies just prior to publication of the title, bringing the total number in print to 3.7 million. Among the major bookselling outlets, only Borders reported first-day sales figures for Breaking Dawn, announcing that it sold about 250,000 copies of the book. The first three titles in the Twilight Saga have sold 8.5 million copies in the U.S.