Hunted

Hunted by P.C. and Kristin Cast is #1 on the USA Today's best-seller list, ahead of Twilight. I'm going to be honest, this series is very popular at my library and I have students clamoring for this latest one, but I think it's mediocre. It's in the lower half of of my list of vampire romances (which I binged on for a while there). Now, what I'm anxious for is City of Glass! I know what I'm buying myself for my birthday...

The Otherworldlies

Thanks to Hurricane Ike, I had plenty of spare time to catch up on my reading. One book I especially enjoyed was The Otherworldlies by Jennifer Kogler. The Otherworldlies is about a teen girl who just doesn't fit in with her family or her friends. Weird things are always happening to her. She hears voices, she can predict the weather accurately, and she can even talk to her dog. Although this book was a little slow getting started, I enjoyed the plot. Much like Twilight, this book is a vampire read without being too vampire-y, if that makes any sense. There isn't any romance, but there is a lot of suspense and action. I think this book will really appeal to the younger teen readers who are Stephenie Meyer fans.

L.J. Smith Excitement

I really liked reading the reissue of L.J. Smith's Vampire Diaries, so I am super excited to know that (a) she is writing a fifth book, Vampire Diaries V: Damon, and (b) her Nightworld series is going to be similarly reissued. Yay! Read about it all on her website.

Also, I have really liked Mari Mancussi ever since The Great Sartorial Debate™, and I finally read Boys That Bite. We buy pretty much every YA vampire book published since the teens can't get enough, and I usually end up reading them too. Unless your students/teen patrons are not like this, I suggest getting Boys That Bite. It's light, breezy, "chic lit" vampire stuff with lots of pop culture slang and references, but it's a really easy read and very fun. I haven't liked a lot of vampire books since Twilight, despite my best efforts (ie. reading every one published), but this one was, while not the deepest or certainly scariest book, easy to get into and an enjoyable to read.

The Vampire Diaries by L.J. Smith

I think I've been reading too many YA vampire novels. I guess I hoped I was hooked on this "genre" after reading the Twilight series. However, none have really lived up to that, and I've only thought they were all mediocre stories. And the other day I was trying to help an English teacher choose indepent reading novels for her class list, and I realized that I was not much help because I hadn't read most of the books I was suggesting to her. If she had wanted teen vampire fiction, then I would have been utterly helpful.

Anyway, I say all this to lead into a vampire book that I actually quite liked. The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening & the Struggle by L.J. Smith actually had an interesting and non-obvious plot, well-developed characters, and really good suspense. It was dark and not completely high school-cliquish, the way a vampire novel ought to be IMO. I was more scared reading this than I ever was reading Twilight. It's about a human high school senior named Elena who is beautiful and popular. When school starts, a hot, mysterious new boy (Stefan) is attending school with her. Elena is attracted to him and tries to pursue him, after dumping her cute and extremely nice and reliable boyfriend Matt. Of course, Stefan is a vampire who was born centuries before. He is trying to escape the ugliness of vampire life by blending in as a high schooler in small Fells Church, VA. Weird and creepy things start happening to Elena and others she knows. A homeless man is found dead with his throat ripped open, and a girl is almost attacked in the graveyard on homecoming night. Stefan is blacking out when these events occur, and he thinks he is doing it (and so does most of the town). He tries to stay away from Elena because she reminds him of someone he once knew and because he is trying to protect her from himself. But she is strong-willed and their attraction is great, so eventually they succumb to their attraction. But all is still not well! Stefan's evil older brother, Damon, has followed Stefan to Fells Church and is also determined to have Elena for himself.

Vampire Academy

Okay, let's start with the most important thing about this book: Is it just me, or does the cover model look like Angelina Jolie?

So the basic plot of Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead is that, in addition to humans, there are three major players in the vampire world. Moroi are mortal vampires who must be protected from the evil immortal vampires, the Strigoi. Moroi are protected by Dhampir who are half vampire and half human (Moroi can't mate with each other). The two main characters are Lissa, a Moroi princess, and her best friend Rose, a Dhampir "guardian"-in-training. The book opens with them being taken back to the secluded Vampire Academy in Montana that they escaped from a year previously. From there, it's half high school cliques and politics and half serious vampire-world issues. For instance, Lissa has secret healing powers that take a toll on her emotionally and physically, and Rose can get inside of Lissa's head to experience what she does. Both girls have complicated romantic interests, and someone is leaving dead animals for Lissa to find.

I enjoyed the book and read it in two sittings. However, I would most likely recommend it to voracious readers who have already read everything else in the library or to readers who really like vampire books. I'd say it's probably comparable to Melissa de la Cruz, possibly a little bit more developed.