The 8 Best Vampire Books Not Written by Anne Rice

Sink your teeth into apocalyptic tales and twisted romance

In vampire stories, the immortal creatures of the night often trace their lineage back centuries. The authors of these stories are themselves part of a creative bloodline that took myths about blood-sucking monsters and turned them into timeless stories of horror. The genre’s foundations were laid by Sheridan Le Fanu's 1872 novella Carmilla and Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, but Anne Rice is the undisputed master of the modern vampire story.

By shifting the focus of the narrative from the vampire’s victims to the creatures themselves, Rice made vampires more sympathetic monsters. She penned 13 books in The Vampire Chronicles, inspiring multiple adaptations and a host of imitators. If you’ve already read the genre’s classics, we’ve put together a chronological list of the 8 best vampire books to read this spooky season.

I Am Legend (1954) by Richard Matheson

Bram Stoker was the first author to portray vampirism as a disease rather than a purely mythical curse, and Richard Matheson built on that idea with his post-apocalyptic novel. While Francis Lawrence’s 2007 film adaptation had Will Smith fighting bloodthirsty people infected with an experimental virus, the original book focuses on the sole survivor of a plague that turned most humans into vampires. Matheson’s book is even darker than the movie. It's a strange and powerful tale about loneliness and being left behind by a changed world. Beyond infusing sci-fi into the vampire genre, I Am Legend also established the tropes of zombie apocalypse stories.

'Salem’s Lot (1975) by Stephen King

A year after publishing his first novel, Carrie, Stephen King penned his Dracula-inspired book 'Salem’s Lot. Continuing King’s focus on the horrors of Maine, the story follows Ben Mears, an author who returns to his hometown seeking inspiration for his next book. As Ben investigates an old abandoned mansion and the death of a young boy, he discovers that the residents of Jerusalem’s Lot are being transformed into vampires. Read the book and skip Gary Dauberman’s mediocre 2024 film adaptation.

Let the Right One In (2004) by John Ajvide Lindqvist

The chilling novel set in 1980s Stockholm follows Oskar, a bullied 12-year-old boy who befriends Eli, a vampire eternally trapped in the body of a child. Let the Right One In has received two excellent adaptations — Tomas Alfredson’s moody 2008 film and Matt Reeves’ 2010 Let Me In. But it’s still worth reading the book, which provides more details on Eli’s origins and her relationship with her current adult guardian. While the focus is on Oskar and Eli’s twisted dynamic, Lindqvist also offers haunting portraits of the broken people trying to get by who become Eli’s victims.

The Historian (2005) by Elizabeth Kostova

A rich retelling of the story of Dracula, The Historian uses a series of letters and testimonials to link three generations of scholars traveling the world seeking the truth about Vlad the Impaler. There is an almost Lovecraftian aspect to the book’s Gothic horror, as scholars repeatedly encounter knowledge that consumes their lives and leads them down destructive paths they can’t resist. It’s a beautiful and fascinating story about obsession that combines ancient history, mythology, and very personal tales of love and vengeance.

The Passage (2010) by Justin Cronin

Following in the footsteps of I Am Legend, The Passage focuses on a vampiric infection that spreads across the world. A scientist leading an expedition to study bats in Bolivia returns home infected with a mysterious virus the U.S. government believes it can weaponize. But the secret experiments have terrible consequences, and it might be up to a young girl used as a test subject to save the world. The wildly ambitious doorstopper alternates between covering the origins of the outbreak and the bleak future where most of humanity has been wiped out. Cronin continued the story with a trilogy, but The Passage is the best part of the series.

The Lesser Dead (2014) by Christopher Buehlman

Anne Rice specializes in unreliable narrators, and Christopher Buehlman follows in that tradition with the story of Joey Peacock, a vampire living in an abandoned section of the New York subway in 1978. While he’s been around for decades, Joey still looks and acts like a 14-year-old. He’s gotten a little bored with his routine of clubbing, feeding, and living by the rules of the city’s other vampires. When he sees a group of childlike vampires hunting the subway, he tries to figure out where they come from and what they mean for his gang. Buehlman built on his vampire mythology with his dark 2016 road trip novel The Suicide Motor Club.

The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires (2020) by Grady Hendrix

A cozy mystery spin on vampire horror follows Patricia Campbell, a Charleston mom who finds an escape from her caregiving duties in a true-crime book club. She becomes interested in the disappearance and deaths of several Black children even though the police won’t help. But even her book club thinks Patricia is just being paranoid. Her search for answers leads to the shocking revelation that her seductive new neighbor is a vampire using the town’s racism to his advantage.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil (2025) by V. E. Schwab

A true spiritual successor to Interview with the Vampire, Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil is a toxic love story about three lesbian vampires told across centuries of bloodshed and betrayal. Ranging from 16th-century Spain to 21st-century Boston, Schwab’s book gets back to the genre’s roots as erotic stories of people who defy societal norms. Undeath is all too seductive for women who want to escape their limited options. Schwab’s rich characters and luscious descriptions make this a perfect read for Anne Rice fans.