Before Twilight, there was Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the big-budget releases of Interview with a Vampire and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. One of the original horror movie villains was Nosferatu in 1922, and he just keeps coming back to terrify and delight us. Vampires keep coming back because they’re fun, and they’re a fantastic metaphor for so many different social issues. Dracula addressed the fading aristocracy, sucking society dry with their predatory needs. At the same time, in Buffy, vampires served a lot of different metaphorical and thematic purposes, with Buffy fighting the literal demons to process her grief and trauma. She also found love with her sworn enemy—the enemies-to-lovers angst of vampire stories is just irresistible. Young adult vampire fiction is a bit of a different beast, but it remains so fascinating because you have to wonder what it would be like to be frozen as a teenager. Kicking up the drama of adolescence with the darkness of vampire lore nearly always makes for an entertaining read. Since vampires will never leave us, I’m going to dive into the best YA vampire reads and celebrate the spookiest season the best way I know how.
YA Vampire Books: The Supernatural Perils of Adolescence
Why Vampires?
The dark, dangerous nature of vampires will always be a fun place to explore. After vampires broke out of the manor houses that defined the early depictions, the possibilities opened up. Issues of mortality, fear of the unknown, and forbidden desires are baked into vampire stories and rich for contemplation. For teenagers, vampires represent the eternal youth that seems attractive when they’re just starting to encounter the fear of growing up. At the same time, they have an appeal of darkness that allow us to explore our own demons and cravings. I’d like to shout out my friends who love talking vampires with me, and I hope we never stop. There’s a wealth of vampire stories to read, from non-western focus to manga to diverse vampire stories for adults. You could choose to read vampire fiction for the rest of your mortal life and not be lacking for great reads. However, an immortal life might require an expansion of genre.
