It was a dark and horny night. I was sitting alone in my sheer nightgown by the fire when a vampire stole through my window. He looked at me with ravenous, red eyes. I told him wait, before you erotically slay me, allow me to tell you a story. I told him of the best vampire stories of all time.
1. The Vampire Chronicles
Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles is the Holy Grail of vampire fiction. A sprawling series about a cadre of ancient vampires, the first novel Interview With The Vampire is a freaky, existential, and totally homoerotic masterpiece about a vampire, his newly turned protege, and all the people unfortunate enough to cross paths with these two psychos. While Brahm Stoker (and Sheridan Le Fanu) may have invented the genre, Anne Rice inarguably perfected it.
2. Dracula
Dracula is credited with having singlehandedly invented the modern vampire novel. That isn’t exactly the case. Sheridan Le Fanu’s sapphic horror novel Carmilla brought vampires to the public decades before. However, Brahm Stoker’s Dracula, for one reason or another, made a meteoric impact on the genre, inspiring Hollywood vampire flicks and creepy tales about bloodsuckers for decades to come.
3. Let The Right One In
Let The Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist isn’t your tradish vampire yarn, and that’s what makes it one of the best. The plot is set in cold and dreary Northern Europe, where a young Swedish boy lives a lonely life with his mother in the suburbs. One night he meets a mysterious little girl who lives nearby, and the two become fast friends. The boy loves her so much that he’s willing to do anything for the little night dweller, including get his hands bloody when it comes time to feed.
4. Salem’s Lot
Stephen King is hailed as The King of Horror, and Salem’s Lot proves why. A master of the genre, King takes a bite out of vampire fiction. There’s something… off about the sleepy little Northeastern town of Jerusalem’s Lot. It’s got such a bad vibe that people in the area call it “Salem’s Lot.” When an author returns to his hometown to work on a book and hears tale of a local boy who turned up dead, he begins to suspect dark, bloodsucking forces are at work.
5. Midnight Mass
Before it was the best horror series on Netflix, F. Paul Wilson’s Midnight Mass was a similarly Catholic-themed vampire horror novel. Vampires have come pouring out of Eastern Europe and are slowly taking over the world, turning human beings into vampires, thralls, and cattle to be fed upon. In a New Jersey beach town a priest, a rabbi, and a nun are preparing to make a stand against the forces of the night in their local tri-state area.
6. Carmilla
Before there was Dracula, there was Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla. One of the first ever sapphic horror novels, Carmilla centers around the wealthy young Laura, whose family has agreed to take in the beautiful Carmilla to live with them in their rural Austrian estate. What starts as a passionate friendship between the two women soon becomes dark, obsessive, and totally gay.
7. The Strain
Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s The Strain puts the nail in the coffin of the idea of the sexy vampire. The vampires of The Strain—strigori they’re called—are hideous, hairless, semi-human monstrosities that bite humans with a yard-long proboscis that comes out of their mouths. Gross. These vamps use their gross biology to inject victims with parasitic vampire worms, mutating them into monstrosities. Somebody’s gotta put an end to this thing, and that somebody is Dr. Ephraim “Eph” Goodweather of the CDC.
8. The Southern Vampire Mysteries
Remember True Blood? Charlaine Harris’ The Southern Vampire Mysteries is where the adventures of Sookie Stackhouse began! Sookie is a telepathic waitress living in Bon Temps, Louisiana in a world where synthetic blood has been created, and vampires can finally come out of hiding to coexist with humans. One such vamp is hottie Bill Compton, whom Sookie becomes involved with at the same time a series of vampire-esque murders rock her town. Looks like the duo must investigate!
9. Vampires In the Lemon Grove
Vampires In the Lemon Grove may only feature one vampire short story in its collection, but that story is a doozy. A vampire couple has decided to live out their days in a sun-kissed lemon grove in Italy and attempt to satisfy their thirst with lemonade instead of plasma. The result is an Only Lovers Left Alive musing about an undead couple with nothing but time on their hands. If only they could agree on how to spend it.
10. Fledgling
Fledgling is Octavia Butler’s contribution to the vampire genre, which centers around a young amnesiac woman named Shori. After an attempt on her life, Shori discovers she is a genetically modified vampire whose dark skin allows her to walk in the sunlight. From there, Butler deconstructs the entire vampire mythology, asking why we romanticize these blood-sucking night creatures in the first place?
11. The Pale Lady
The Three Musketeers wasn’t the only classic penned by Alexandre Dumas! The Pale Lady is about a Polish beauty named Hedwig who becomes the apple of two brothers’ eyes. Unlucky for her, one of these brothers is a vampire! The Pale Lady pulls none of the Gothic punches. It’s got misty nights, creepy castles, and a haunted romance doomed to die.
12. The Gilda Stories
The Gilda Stories did the unthinkable and gave us a vampire tale that doesn’t involve any sort of glib serial killer romanticization! After fleeing from enslavement in the antebellum South, the young Gilda is taken in by two vampire brothel owners and decides to turn herself when she comes of age. The novel shows vignettes of Gilda’s life over the next two centuries, where she lives a thoughtful, moral, and romantic existence as a vampire bearing witness to history.
13. Fevre Dream
Fevre Dream by George R.R. Martin… wait… THAT George R.R. Martin, you must be thinking? YES. THAT George R.R. Martin. Before the author hit the jackpot with Game of Thrones, he tried his hand at vampire fiction—and did a damn good job of it. Set in the antebellum South, the tale revolves around an eccentric river captain named Abner Marsh who partners up with wealthy New Yorker Joshua York who is planning to bankroll the former’s idea for a new-fangled steamship. Poor Josh soon discovers he’s in over his head when he realizes that Abner keeps some peculiar company … company that only comes around at night.
Published: Aug 26, 2024 05:38 pm