When the weather turns cooler and the nights grow longer, when leaves begin to turn the color of pumpkins, that’s when it comes: the hunger. It starts softly. A horror movie here. A spooky comic there. Then it grows, and if you’re anything like me, before you know it, you find yourself elbow-deep in novels. The hunger never really goes away; it just sleeps. It waits. And vampire books are like vampires themselves: one feeding just isn’t going to cut it.
Vampire fans have been pretty lucky for the past couple of years. Between Stephanie Meyer’s return to the world of Twilight with Midnight Sun and Jay Kristoff’s Empire of the Vampire—the bastard lovechild of The Witcher, Interview with a Vampire, and Castlevania—we’ve had plenty to sink our teeth into. But with everything going on in the world, you might have missed some new vampire books that absolutely deserve to be added to the Bram Stoker canon.
Certain Dark Things by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Silvia Moreno-Garcia of Mexican Gothic fame recently re-released her cult hit, Certain Dark Things, about a girl descended from Aztec blood-drinkers whose family comes under fire by a European clan encroaching on their territory. As the last survivor of a hit, Atl, along with her bioengineered dog, finds herself in need of help in the neon streets of a reimagined noir Mexico City as she runs from shark-toothed mob monsters. Unfortunately for her, vampires are illegal in Mexico City, and the cleaning crews–and cops–aren’t about to let Atl keep a low profile. Come for the vampires, stay for the critique of colonization and police corruption.
Vampires Never Get Old: Tales with Fresh Bite edited by Natalie C. Parker and Zoraida Córdova
This is one of those books that gives you a lot of bang for your buck. Natalie C. Parker and Zoraida Córdova have put together a brilliant anthology of vampire stories, including such authors as Rebecca Roanhorse, Mark Oshiro, Tessa Gratton, and V.E. Schwab, among others. With a list like that, how can you go wrong? And Schwab’s sapphic story “First Kill” is currently slated to appear as an eight-episode series on Netflix soon.
The Lost Girls: A Vampire Revenge Story by Sonia Hartl
You know the story: boy meets girl. Girl falls in love with boy. Boy happens to be an ancient vampire, and girl wants to be turned. Only…what if, after fifty years or so, boy is tired of girl and wants to fall in love with the next teen? That’s Lost Girls in a nutshell. A group of teenage girls turned by the same vampire get together to kill him and keep him from turning the next teenager, who has no idea what she’s in for. Plus, there’s an additional complication when Holly falls for the human girl she’s supposed to be protecting from her ex.
Walk Among Us by Cassandra Khaw, Genevieve Gornichec, and Caitlin Starling
Walk Among Us is another anthology, this time with a tie-in to the Vampire: the Masquerade series of roleplay games. But don’t worry if you’re not well-versed in the World of Darkness; each story is perfectly approachable as a beginner. In Genevieve Gornichec’s “A Sheep Among Wolves”, a young woman tries to fight her depression with a support group that turns out to be more than she bargained for. In Cassandra Khaw’s “Fine Print”, alpha male tech bro learns what it means to be prey instead of predator. And in Caitlin Starling’s “The Land of Milk and Honey”, ethical farming is taken to an entirely new level of unsettling.
A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson
Every word in A Dowry of Blood drips gothic romance in this reimagined queer tale of Dracula’s brides. With swift pacing and a tight plot, it’s a quick read that I finished in one sitting. Who doesn’t want to read a breakup letter/murder confession against an abusive POS? At its heart, Dowry is a tale of revenge. Delicious, delicious revenge, after Dracula’s two wives and husband learn that their master takes his jealousy seriously.
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Do you have any recent vampire books you think shouldn’t be missed? Comment below!
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The First Sister
Linden A. Lewis (she/they) is a queer writer and world wanderer currently living in Madrid with a couple of American cats who have little kitty passports. Tall, tattooed, and the author of The First Sister trilogy, Linden exists only because society has stopped burning witches.
This isn’t as recent but Sunshine, by Robin McKinley, will forever be my favorite vampire novel. I think it’s a real masterpiece.
Vivian Shaw’s Greta Helsing trilogy has lots of vampires, some of them classic vampires in the modern world. The main character is a human doctor specializing in the illnesses of magical creatures. Odd and intense.
The Route of Ice and Salt by José Luis Zárate (translated by David Bowles). It’s a retelling of the portion of Dracula’s journey from Transylvania to Whtiby by one of the crewman of the Demeter. To summarize, the novella is a “reimagining of Dracula’s journey to England, filled with Gothic imagery and queer desire.” The book was mentioned in an interview with Silvia Moreno-Garcia as a story she enjoyed that is now available translated into English.
I’ve heard amazing things about Jay Kristoff’s Empire of the Vampire. I hope to read it before the end of the year!
“Fevre Dream” by (yes) George R. R. Martin.
Agree @cc Sunshine is the best vampire novel. Ever. However, some honourable mentions (oldies but goodies) are:
James Asher Vampire Novel series (8 Books) by Barbara Hambley
Vampires of Melbourne (2 Books) by Narrelle M. Harris
The Immortal Empire trilogy by Kate Locke. Enjoyed immensely. The mass market paperback/Kindle pop art-colored covers caught my eye at the bookstore, and they did not disappoint.
Carpe Jugulum by Sir Terry.
13 Bullets by David Wellington was pretty terrifying. As was at least the first part of The Passage by Justin Cronin.
Teeth: Vampire Tales edited by Ellen Datlow and Terry Windling was good.
Sunshine has been in my TBR pile for years. I clearly gotta dig that one out and put it at the top. And Certain Dark Things has been ordered!
I have been loving the Judge Dee stories by Lavie Tidhar here on Tor.com. And Stephen Graham Jones’ Wait for Night story from here made me go pick up everything else he has written that I could find.
@6 terngirl: Barbara Hambly’s books aren’t all that “oldie” — the 8th book, Prisoner of Midnight, was published in March 2019, and the sequel short story “Gravemould and Ectoplasm” in October 2019. For me, these (I mean, the whole series) are the only vampire books worth reading any more, with the exception (of course) of Terry Pratchett’s Carpe Jugulum.
The Golden by the late Lucius Shepard is, typically, outstanding.
Anno Dracula by Kim Newman is very good. Dracula isn’t stopped, and Victorian England becomes dominated by vampires. It includes classic fictional characters from the era.
I love vampire novels. Some of my favorites:
“The Lesser Dead” by Christopher Buehlman (Scary vampires, scarier vampires, and a very unreliable narrator.)
“Motherless Child” by Glen Hirshberg (What mothers will do to protect their sons)
“The Night Cyclist” by Stephen Graham Jones (Novella)
Two with very different vampires (from the typical, but also from each other):
Octavia Butler, Fledgling
Peter Watts, Blindsight
Both great, but of the two, Blindsight is what my brain has come to think of now as real vampires, with every other story a myth tacked on on top of that.
The Watts, by the way, is a superb SF novel, with vampires as one thread. If you’re narrowly interested just in vampires, look at the presentation he made (at various SF cons) about the vampires in the novel (in character from in the world) where he discusses just them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEOUaJW05bU. But if you like that, it’s well worth seeing them in action by reading the novel.
Black Ambrosia by Elisabeth Engstrom is an older title that deserved some mention, as it is a fantastic vampire novel that diverge quite a bit from the usual vampire lore. It was reedited recently in the Paperbacks from Hell collection.
Tanya Huff’s “Blood Series” (Blood Price, Blood Trail, Blood Lines, Blood Pact, Blood Debt). Hard not to like a vampire who was the bastard son of King Henry VIII, and who now earns money by writing historical romances (based, of course, on his own experiences in those times).
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro’s St. Germain series.
These are not new, but they were the first vampire novels I ever read, and I loved them. They’re wonderful historical fiction, and Count St. Germain is extraordinary.
Another Tor list from last year discussed books where magic and the occult creep unsettlingly into the “normal” world. One of the recommended books on there was The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova and it’s an incredible vampire tale. Filled with creeping horror and gripping from start to finish.
If you want something fun, modern and breezy, check out MaryJanice Davidson’s Queen Betsy series (first book is Undead and Unwed). Hilarious, sexy and all-round fun.
If you’re looking for a brillian short story, there’s Neil Gaiman’s short story “Snow, Glass, Apples” (look for the beautifully illustrated version by Colleen Doran) and Tanith Lee’s short stories “Red as Blood” and “Bite Me Not or Fleur de Fur”, both in the collection Forests of the Night.
Agyar by Steven Brust. The word “vampire” is never actually used in the book.
A classic: Saberhagen’s The Dracula Tapes and subsequent works.
Stross’s The Rhesus Chart, part of his Laundry Files series.
At Patreon: A short story by Alexandra Erin called The Vampire’s Reflection was an interesting new take on the subject. It’s worth a buck to read, in my opinion. Shades of Saberhagen, Anne Rice, and Max Brooks (of WWZ fame), all in one.
Been forever and a day since I read it but I really loved VAMPIRE$ by Steakley.
For more lighthearted there’s Bloodsucking Fiends by the always delightful Christopher Moore.
@cc, @Elizabeth: Enthusiastic seconds for Sunshine and The Historian. And I’ll add John M. Ford’s The Dragon Waiting to this list.