Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies, and More!
For more scary stories, try this booklist:
Horror & Suspense for Older Teens
The Summoning / by Kelley Armstrong
fter fifteen-year-old Chloe starts seeing ghosts and is sent to Lyle House, a mysterious group home for mentally disturbed teenagers, she soon discovers that neither Lyle House nor its inhabitants are exactly what they seem, and that she and her new friends are in danger. SEQUEL: The Awakening.
Tithe / by Holly Black
After returning home from a tour with her mother’s rock band, sixteen-year-old Kaye, who has been visited by faeries since childhood, discovers that she herself is a magical faerie creature with a special destiny. SEQUEL: Ironside.
Valiant / by Holly Black
When she runs away to New York with a new identity in the hopes of getting lost in the crowd, seventeen-year-old Valerie Russell finds that escape from her own reality is impossible, as she encounters colorful, desperate, and strange new friends who end up giving her the surprise of her life.
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War / by Max Brooks
An account of the decade-long conflict between humankind and hordes of the predatory undead is told from the perspective of dozens of survivors who describe in their own words the epic human battle for survival.
The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection From the Living Dead / by Max Brooks
An illustrated, comprehensive guide to surviving an attack by hordes of the predatory undead explains zombie physiology and behavior, the most effective weaponry and defense strategies, how to outfit one’s home for a long siege, and how to survive in any territory or terrain.
Bloodline / by Kate Cary
Returning from World War I with nightmares that won’t end, especially those of his regiment’s commander, Quincy Harker, John Shaw is shocked to discover that Harker has found a way to his hometown in an attempt to woo his sister and keep Dracula’s bloodline alive in his own disastrous manner. SEQUEL: Bloodline: Reckoning.
Marked / by P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast
When sixteen-year-old Zoey Redbird is Marked as a fledgling vampyre, she joins the House of Night, where she will train to become an adult vampyre. That is, if she makes it through the Change; not all of those who are chosen do. It’s tough to begin a new life, away from her parents and friends, and on top of that, Zoey finds she is no average fledgling–nor is she the only fledgling at the House of Night with special powers. SEQUELS: Betrayed; Chosen; Untamed; Hunted.
City of Bones / by Cassandra Clare
Suddenly able to see demons and the Darkhunters who are dedicated to returning them to their own dimension, fifteen-year-old Clary Fray is drawn into this bizarre world when her mother disappears and Clary herself is almost killed by a monster. SEQUELS: City of Ashes, City of Glass.
Blue Bloods / by Melissa de la Cruz
When Schuyler Van Alen, a sophomore at a prestigious New York City private school, turns fifteen, she notices herself going through physical and psychological changes that may have something to do with a fellow coed’s murder in which she was found drained of all her blood. SEQUELS: Masquerade, Revelations.
Walk of the Spirits / by Richie Tankersley Cusick
After losing everything in a Florida hurricane, seventeen-year-old Miranda and her mother move to her grandfather’s home in Louisiana, where she falls in with an interesting group of students, and discovers that she can communicate with spirits like her grandfather did.
Evernight / by Claudia Gray
Sixteen-year-old Bianca, a new girl at the sinister Evernight boarding school, finds herself drawn to another outsider, Jared, but dark forces threaten to tear them apart and destroy Bianca’s entire world. SEQUEL: Stargazer.
The Society of S / by Susan Hubbard
Thirteen-year-old half-vampire Ariella Montero struggles with the realities of her condition while harboring a desire to unravel the secrets of vampire nature, a longing that leads her to learn about the gentle, wise, and even vegetarian lifestyles of vampires.
Zombie Blondes / by Brian James
Each time fifteen-year-old Hannah and her out-of-work father move she has some fears about making friends, but a classmate warns her that in Maplecrest, Vermont, the cheerleaders really are monsters.
You Are So Undead To Me / by Stacey Jay
Megan Berry, a Carol, Arkansas, high school student who can communicate with the Undead, must team up with her childhood friend Ethan to save homecoming from an army of flesh-hungry zombies.
Repossessed / by A.M. Jenkins
Tired of tormenting the damned and being stuck in Hell, demon Kiriel decides to take a vacation in the slightly used body of a seventeen-year-old boy, in this wickedly funny look at the complexities of being a teenager.
Devilish / by Maureen Johnson
During her senior year at St. Teresa’s Preparatory School, Jane must battle against the devil, who is masquerading as a sophomore with a penchant for cupcakes, to save her best friend Ally, who has sold her soul in exchange for popularity.
Need / by Carrie Jones
When her family falls apart and she is sent to live with her grandmother in a rural town in Maine, Zara begins to feel as though she may be able to start life anew–until a stalking pixie with bad intentions makes himself known and causes chaos in her emotionally fragile world.
Love is Hell
Sure, love is hell. But it’s totally worth it. In these supernatural stories by five of today’s hottest writers (Melissa Marr, Scott Westerfeld, Justine Larbalestier, Gabrielle Zevin, and Laurie Faria Stolarz), love may be twisted and turned around, but it’s more potent than ever on its quest to conquer all.
Wicked Lovely / by Melissa Marr
Seventeen-year-old Aislinn, who has the ability to see faeries, is drawn against her will into a centuries-old battle between the Summer King and Winter Queen, and the survival of her life, her love, and summer itself all hang in the balance. SEQUELS: Ink Exchange; Fragile Eternity.
Uninvited / by Amanda Marrone
Jordan thinks her life can’t get any worse as she sits drinking alone in her room–until her dead ex-boyfriend starts appearing nightly at her window asking to come in.
Gil’s All Fright Diner / by A. Lee Martinez
Hired by the owner of an all-night diner to eliminate the zombie problem that is costing her customers, werewolf Duke and vampire Earl tackle an even stickier adversary who is out to take over the diner, in an adventure involving an amorous ghost, a jailbait sorceress, and a pig-latin occult.
Vampire Academy / by Richelle Mead
Two years after a horrible incident made them run away, vampire princess Lissa and her guardian-in-training Rose are found and returned to St. Vladimir’s Academy, where one focuses on mastering magic, the other on physical training, while both try to avoid the perils of gossip, cliques, gruesome pranks, and sinister plots. SEQUELS: Frostbite, Shadow Kiss.
Suck It Up / by Brian Meehl
A teenage vampire sets out to prove that not all vampires are the same by demonstrating his non-violent attitude, his sensitive nature, and his desperate need for understanding as the soy-blood substitute drinking guy and Vampire Pride Parade participant that he is.
Twilight / by Stephenie Meyer
Isabella Swan’s move to Forks, a perpetually rainy town in Washington, could have been the most boring move she ever made. But when she meets the mysterious, alluring Edward Cullen–a vampire–her life takes a thrilling and terrifying romantic turn. SEQUELS: New Moon, Eclipse, Breaking Dawn.
Baltimore, or, The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire / by Mike Mignola & Christopher Golden
After unwittingly awakening the wrath of a vampire on the World War I battlefields, Lord Henry Baltimore vows to vanquish the evil that he has unleashed on the world, in an illustrated tale of the paranormal that serves as an allegory for the nature of war.
Evermore / by Alison Noël
Since the car accident that claimed the lives of her family, sixteen-year-old Ever can see auras and hear people’s thoughts, and she goes out of her way to hide from other people until she meets Damen, another psychic teenager who is hiding even more mysteries. SEQUEL: Blue Moon.
Prom Nights From Hell
Five best-selling authors (Meg Cabot, Kim Harrison, Michele Jaffe, Stephenie Meyer, and Lauren Myracle) put their own spin on the prom night from hell, offering up everything from fledgling superheroes to grim reapers to a creepy update on the classic three-wishes-gone-bad tale.
The Forest of Hands and Teeth / by Carrie Ryan
Through twists and turns of fate, orphaned Mary seeks knowledge of life, love, and especially what lies beyond her walled village and the surrounding forest, where dwell the Unconsecrated, aggressive flesh-eating people who were once dead.
Eternal / by Cynthia Leitich Smith
When Miranda’s guardian angel Zachary recklessly saves her from falling into an open grave and dying, she is turned into a vampire as a result, and he is left to try to reinstate his reputation by finally doing the right thing.
Tantalize / by Cynthia Leitich Smith
When multiple murders in Austin, Texas, threaten the grand re-opening of her family’s vampire-themed restaurant, seventeen-year-old, orphaned Quincie worries that her best friend-turned-love interest, Keiren, a werewolf-in-training, may be the prime suspect.
Vacations From Hell
Some of today’s most popular authors (Libba Bray, Cassandra Clare, Claudia Gray, Maureen Johnson, and Sarah Mlynowski) offer stories about vacations that take an unexpected turn for the worse, in settings that range from a Jamaican villa to a haunted village in Eastern Europe.
Kitty and the Midnight Hour / by Carrie Vaughn
When Kitty Norville, a DJ for a Denver radio station and a secret werewolf, accidentally launches a late-night advice show for the supernaturally disadvantaged, she becomes the target of a werewolf hunter and several homicidal undead.
Generation Dead / by Daniel Waters
When dead teenagers who have come back to life start showing up at her high school, Phoebe, a goth girl, becomes interested in the phenomenon, and when she starts dating a “living impaired” boy, they encounter prejudice, fear, and hatred. SEQUEL: Kiss of Life.
Peeps / by Scott Westerfeld
Cal Thompson is a carrier of a parasite that causes vampirism, and must hunt down all of the girlfriends he has unknowingly infected before they can create even more of their kind. SEQUEL: The Last Days.