Dark Moon

Best Vampire Books for Young Adults

Twilight Series by Stephanie Meyer
While not a personal favorite, it has become a cult preference amongst teenagers and adults alike and is being claimed as one of the best vampire romance novels to have been released in a long time. Chronicling the love story between Isabella Swan or Bella, a human and Edward Cullen, a vampire, the series is a set of four books, Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn. The series has won numerous awards, has been translated into 38 languages and is now the basis for a movie series starring Robert Pattinson and Kristin Stewart. The fourth book may be potentially divided into two movies.

House of Night by PC Cast and Kristin Cast
This continuing series of books revolves around the life of a young vampire, Zoey Redbird, at the House of Night boarding school based at Tulsa in Oklahama. Written by a mother-daughter duo, the first book in the series was released in 2007, with seven books being published till date. The series, which is intended to be a twelve book series has been released in 39 countries. Most books in the series have been bestsellers on the New York Times Best Seller list, making them some of the best vampire books to read.

Lost Souls by Poppy Z. Brite
A teen cult classic, Lost Souls by Poppy Brite is an explosive mix of humans, vampires and teen angst. Though, the novel has characters from Brite's earlier short story, The Seed of Lost Souls, the protagonist of this novel is a boy called Jason aka Nothing, who discovers his vampire heritage and sets out on a journey to search for his vampire family and the band Lost Souls. The book released to widespread critical acclaim, praised for its portrayal of teen rage, their need to discover themselves and creating a world where magic and mystery become impossibly real. While the book is mature in its content and has extremely graphic and violent passages, it is a brilliant read for young adults.

The Saga of Darren Shan by Darren Shan
A series comprising of four trilogies and therefore, 12 books, The Saga of Darren Shan, started of as a side project, to keep Darren Shan, the author, busy while he was in between writing two adult books. The first book, Cirque du Freak, received such good reviews, that it metamorphosed into a series of 12 books, about a young boy who is forced by a vampire to become his assistant and a half-vampire. The first trilogy, Vampire Blood, revolves around Darren trying to accept vampire traditions and what he has become. Vampire Rites, the second trilogy is about him trying to be accepted by the close knit clan of vampires. In Vampire War, Darren learns about the role he needs to play to decide the fate of vampires and in he final trilogy,Vampire Destiny, Darren faces his nemesis, the Lord of the Vamapnzee, sworn enemies of the vampire clan. The series of 12 books was published over a period of 6 years and is widely heralded as the best vampire books series for young adults.

While not a comprehensive list, this collection of the best vampire books of all time for adults and youngsters, lists out those books that are classics and have changed the way we, as readers, started looking at vampire fiction, categorizing it as a sub-genre in its own right.