Vampire Academy

While we've given a selection of some of the more serious works of Vampire fiction, sometimes you want a more low brow read, one full of teen angst, young adults, and some of the trappings that made the Twilight books a hit.In that vein, Richelle Mead created a pretty solid YA masterpiece when she penned the ‘Vampire Academy’ series, a lighter, more romantic take on the vampire genre, set in a schoolyard stage. These books, typically targeted at young adults, perfectly combined a classic teenage vampire story and twisted it into a truly unique and detailed vampire fantasy. While this book does stick to some tradition vampire lore, Mead creates an entirely new narrative and unprecedented take on the vampire world that is free of awkward phrasing and sappy characterization. The use of a highly trained ‘guardian’ to protect a mortal vampire princess from immortal vampire assassins is certainly a twist on the classic vampire novel that no reader has seen before. Although the various subplots of this series are fairly predictable (hint: the protagonist falling in love with her trainer/vampire princess falling in love with a naïve nerd), it is the entire vampire reality that Mead creates which makes this series a far more intriguing and compelling read than most other vampire novels. While the film adaptation of these novels wasn’t exactly a box-office hit, this novel and its accompanying film are an entertaining and easy read that can give you a good hit of vampire fiction to keep you going until another vampire novel hits the shelves.