Non-Twilighty Vampire Novels for YA recommendations requested.

[Czarcasm]

Another vote for Tanya Huff’s Blood series.

[Mr.Excellent]

Blindsight, by Peter Watts. Vampires, in space, fighting space aliens! http://www.amazon.com/Blindsight-Peter-Watts/dp/0765312182

[Flutterby]

How could I forget Tanya Huff? Another of my favourite authors, though I own other books not the Blood series (I did read them though). I’ll have to browse my boxes and shelves to see if there are others I have.

[Telcontar]

Patricia Briggs has a wonderful set of werewolf books that include vampires. It might appeal to a YA audience. Strong female protagonist.

For something darker, Fred Saberhagen had a great take on the Dracula story. Painted him principled, though brutal and somewhat alien, figure. The books tended to split half modern day, half historical (the return of an old nemesis interspersed with the first encounter).

[Der_Trihs]

@Telcontar

For something darker, Fred Saberhagen had a great take on the Dracula story. Painted him principled, though brutal and somewhat alien, figure. The books tended to split half modern day, half historical (the return of an old nemesis interspersed with the first encounter).

The Dracula Tapes and sequels. Good stuff. Though someone who doesn’t know who Sherlock Holmes is and something of the stories will miss a lot with The Holmes-Dracula File. For that matter, they’ll miss a lot with The Dracula Tapes if they don’t know at least the basic events of the original Dracula since it’s Dracula’s version of the story.

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

Darkangel, by Meredith Ann Pierce, is a really interesting vampire story. For one thing, it’s set on the moon. It’s not modern-world, mopey-teen vampires; rather, the protagonist is a teenage girl kidnapped by a vampire lord and forced to be his fourteenth wife. It’s weird fiction, and I have fond memories of it.

Oh, I’d forgotten that one; I liked it.

[SkeptiJess]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

Darkangel, by Meredith Ann Pierce, is a really interesting vampire story. For one thing, it’s set on the moon. It’s not modern-world, mopey-teen vampires; rather, the protagonist is a teenage girl kidnapped by a vampire lord and forced to be his fourteenth wife. It’s weird fiction, and I have fond memories of it.

There are 2 sequels to The Darkangel – A Gathering of Gargoyles & The Pearl of the Soul of the World. As has been said, it’s a very weird trilogy, but very good.

[FriarTed]

Adding to Polidori’s The Vampyre and Stoker’s Dracula, I’ll nominate J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla (mid-1800’s lesi subtext warning) and James Malcolm Rymer’s Varney the Vampire, or the Feast of Blood.

Also a second for Pike’s The Last Vampire series, not to be confused with Whitley Strieber’s The Last Vampire.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@SkeptiJess

There are 2 sequels to The Darkangel – A Gathering of Gargoyles & The Pearl of the Soul of the World. As has been said, it’s a very weird trilogy, but very good.

Definitely! When I first saw this thread I couldn’t for the life of me think of the names of the books; all I could remember was that they were set on the moon, the girl was kidnapped by a vampire, and “Pearl” was in the title. Sadly, this was not enough for my google-fu to work with. Overnight I remembered that the author’s name was Pierce, and Bob’s your uncle.

[salinqmind]

(It’s kind of amazing there are so MANY vampire series books around. Back in the olden days, there were so many kid-and-his/her-horse, or kid detectives series.)

[Flutterby]

@salinqmind

(It’s kind of amazing there are so MANY vampire series books around. Back in the olden days, there were so many kid-and-his/her-horse, or kid detectives series.)

They are still out there. Many of the ones I referenced are pre-Twilight, I read them in my teens (not all THAT long ago) but along with the vampires ones I read a number of kid and her horse types, and mysteries.

[Guinastasia]

@Little_Nemo

The Last Vampire series by Christopher Pike seemed good (but I’ll admit I only read the first two books in the series). The heroine is a 5000 year old vampire who appears to be about 17. It’s a YA series but there are some mentions of sex.

The series was originally published in 1994 but it was recently re-issued (post-Twilight) under the name Thirst.

I’ll second this – I did read the entire series. They’re much superior to Twilight. (A lot of the story is drawn from Hindu beliefs and such.)

(In fact, I came into this thread to reccomend TLV series. I always suggest it as an alternative to the Twi-Shite books)

[Lamia]

@FriarTed

Adding to Polidori’s The Vampyre and Stoker’s Dracula, I’ll nominate J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla (mid-1800’s lesi subtext warning) and James Malcolm Rymer’s Varney the Vampire, or the Feast of Blood.

Isn’t Varney something like 900 pages long? That’s another older work I wouldn’t be recommending for a modern teen, not unless she were very, VERY interested in the origins of modern vampire fiction.

[Little_Nemo]

And Varney, while indisputably a milestone in vampire literature, is not what you would normally call well-written.

Picture nine hundred pages of this:

The solemn tones of an old cathedral clock have announced midnight - the air is thick and heavy - a strange, death like stillness pervades all nature. Like the ominous calm which precedes some more than usually terrific outbreak of the elements, they seem to have paused even in
their ordinary fluctuations, to gather a terrific strength for the great effort. A faint peal of thunder now comes from far off. Like a signal gun for the battle of the winds to begin, it appeared to awaken them from their lethargy, and one awful, warring hurricane swept over a whole city, producing more devastation in the four or five minutes it lasted, than would a half century of ordinary phenomena.

It was as if some giant had blown upon some toy town, and scattered many of the buildings before the hot blast of his terrific breath; for as suddenly as that blast of wind had come did it cease, and all was as still and calm as before.

Sleepers awakened, and thought that what they had heard must be the confused chimera of a dream. They trembled and turned to sleep again.

All is still - still as the very grave. Not a sound breaks the magic of repose. What is that - a strange, pattering noise, as of a million of fairy feet? It is hail - yes, a hail-storm has burst over the city. Leaves are dashed from the trees, mingled with small boughs; windows that lie most opposed to the direct fury of the pelting particles of ice are broken, and the rapt repose that before was so remarkable in its intensity, is exchanged for a noise which, in its accumulation, drowns every cry of surprise or consternation which here and there arose from persons who found their houses invaded by the storm.

Now and then, too, there would come a sudden gust of wind that in its strength, as it blew laterally, would, for a moment, hold millions of the hailstones suspended in mid air, but it was only to dash them with redoubled force in some new direction, where more mischief was to be done.

Oh, how the storm raged! Hail - rain - wind. It was, in very truth, an awful night.

Yeah, it was a dark and stormy night, we get it.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

Another vote for 'Salem’s Lot by Stephen King, and I’ll also recommend Fevre Dream by George R.R. Martin, which is about vampires along the Mississippi River before the Civil War. It’s the kind of fun, atmospheric novel that Mark Twain and Bram Stoker might’ve written together. Powerful, memorable ending, too.

[StGermain]

I’m a big fan of Robin McKinley’s Sunshine, and everything else she’s written.

StG

[Chefguy]

For pure fun, try Christopher Moore’s series of books: Bloodsucking Fiends, You Suck, and Bite Me. Sex is commonplace in his books, but they’re very funny reads.

[Tethered_Kite]

I’ll give another vote for Mr. Stoker’s Dracula. The annotated version will give the readers a little history and geography lesson as well as understanding of the social setting in which the novel arose.

Heck, with all the swooning and so forth, an opportunity may even arise for a parental talk about the attraction of the forbidden.

[Ranchoth]

How “young adult” are we talking about, here? I was going to suggest Kim Newman’s Anno Dracula, but on consideration, something that involves Jack the Ripper killing vampire prostitutes—which I think actually involves less sex and violence than the rest of the story, under Victoria’s Prince Consort Dracula—might be a little much.

I mean, I would have loved it as a kid, but, y’know, I’m me.

[Lust4Life]

@Chefguy

“Salems Lot”, by Stephen King, of course.

Totally seconded.

[Necros]

I don’t think a precocious teenager would have any trouble with, and would actually enjoy, Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian.