Here are 77 books that The Vampire, His Kith and Kin fans have personally recommended if you like
The Vampire, His Kith and Kin.
Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission.
In 2009 I published a book on the real vampire community. I didn’t know that Twilightwas about to sweep America and I inadvertently became a “vampire guy” for a few years. I appeared on Geraldo and NPR. I was interviewed by the Colbert Report (but it never aired). I even talked to MTV about hosting a show where I interview teenage vampires. Then we all got into zombies instead and my fifteen minutes of fame were over! I learned a great deal researching my book and giving talks on vampires. In 2010 I taught a special class at Tufts University on vampires where I assigned selections from these books.
Michelle Belanger is a psychic vampire and an intellectual leader of the real vampire community. This book draws on her experiences of coming to self-identify as a psychic vampire and she actually began writing it in notebooks while in college. The Psychic Vampire Codex provided vocabulary for people in this community to talk about their experiences and a metaphysical theory of what exactly psychic vampires are and why they are different from other people.
I have had the opportunity to meet Belanger and she is a really fascinating person. She founded a metaphysical community called House Kheperu and offers workshops on magick and psychic energy. She is also a fiction author, musician, activist, and many other things.
The Psychic Vampire Codex is the first book to examine the phenomenon and experience of modern vampirism completely from the vampire's perspective. Father Sebastiaan, a fellow vampire writes in the foreword that Michelle Belanger's system "introduced a breath of fresh air into the vampire subculture. It freed us to look at ourselves in a new light, and it also helped those outside our community to view us differently. No longer were we parasites or predators . . . we could use our inborn abilities to help people heal." Psychic vampires are people who prey on the vital, human life energies…
In 2009 I published a book on the real vampire community. I didn’t know that Twilightwas about to sweep America and I inadvertently became a “vampire guy” for a few years. I appeared on Geraldo and NPR. I was interviewed by the Colbert Report (but it never aired). I even talked to MTV about hosting a show where I interview teenage vampires. Then we all got into zombies instead and my fifteen minutes of fame were over! I learned a great deal researching my book and giving talks on vampires. In 2010 I taught a special class at Tufts University on vampires where I assigned selections from these books.
This is a really thorough, fascinating encyclopedia of all things vampire––from folklore to nineteenth-century literature to obscure religious movements to comic books and movies to true crime. Whatever you want to know about vampires, this book will have it or tell you where you can find it. J. Gordon Melton is a total fanatic when it comes to vampire lore and he encouraged me early on when I first began researching the vampire community. Besides vampires, Melton loves to collect obscure information and data on all manner of religious groups. He once described himself to me as “a very greedy scholar” because there are so many topics that he tracks and researches. He can also tell you the best used bookstores in any city in America.
Death and immortality, sexual prowess and surrender, intimacy and alienation, rebellion and temptation. The allure of the vampire is eternal. The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead, 3rd edition, explores the historical, literary, mythological, biographical, and popular aspects of one of the world's most mesmerizing paranormal subject. This vast reference is an alphabetical tour of the psychosexual, macabre world of the soul-sucking undead.This exhaustive guide has more than 400 essays to quench your thirst for facts, biographies, definitions, and more.
I am a comic book writer, novelist, and vampire aficionado. I always want to learn the truth of a matter. I’ve moved in and out of the gothic subculture for years and spent time with members of the vampire subculture. I’ve found that most people’s understanding of vampires (and really, everything) is influenced by fiction. Even if you point out that their beliefs are only as accurate as a movie, they will still argue for them. As much as I love a good vampire movie, I want to shatter illusions and explore the myths and folklore that reflect our human experience in all of its horror and glory.
Whereas Barber expounds upon the anthropological origins of the vampire myth, McClelland focuses on the practices, principles, and logistics of killing the dead. The most familiar form comes in the unearthing and mutilation of bodies. McClelland explains the whys and wherefores of that practice, but he also gives their killers more than their due, explaining the role of vampire slayers as shamans, village elders, and quasi-religious figures during Europe’s transition from its pagan roots to modern Christianity. He demonstrates that vampires fell into an uneasy space between a fading system of peasant folklore and the organized religious rituals and beliefs that ultimately took their place. There are no vampires in the Bible, so where was the church during the vampire hysteria of the 1800s and how did they regard these mythical creatures? McClelland answers that and more. He also includes an overview of our modern conception of vampire slayers from…
In contemporary Western popular culture, the vampire has evolved into one of the most recognizable symbols of evil. Yet, less has been said - and even less has been understood - about its nemesis, the vampire slayer. ""Slayers and Their Vampires"" is the first work to explore how the vampire slayer began, and it goes further to ask why the true history of the vampire slayer has been so long ignored. Author Bruce McClelland describes how the literary and screen dramas obscured the darker nature of the slayer, whose persecution of a corpse is accepted as heroic rather than corrupt.…
I’m a scientist, engineer, and writer who has written on a wide range of topics. I’ve been fascinated by mythology my entire life, and I spent over a decade gathering background material on the myth of Perseus and Medusa, and came away with a new angle on the origin and meaning of the myth and what inspired it. I was unable to present this in a brief letter or article, and so decided to turn my arguments into a book.
The book is still in print, and has been cited numerous times by scholarly journals and books. It formed the basis for the History Channel series Clash of the Gods (in which I appear).
The figure of the vampire has become very familiar through portrayals in literature, stage, and cinema, but where does the myth itself originate?
Many have speculated on the roots of the vampire legend, ascribing it to various diseases, like porphyriaor rabies. But Barber stripped away the cultural additions imposed on the legend by its fictional interpretation and looked for origins consistent with the bare, original legend.
A nice piece of folkloric detective work, and one that influenced my own book.
In this engrossing book, Paul Barber surveys centuries of folklore about vampires and offers the first scientific explanation for the origins of the vampire legends. From the tale of a sixteenth-century shoemaker from Breslau whose ghost terrorized everyone in the city, to the testimony of a doctor who presided over the exhumation and dissection of a graveyard full of Serbian vampires, his book is fascinating reading.
"This study's comprehensiveness and the author's bone-dry wit make this compelling reading, not just for folklorists, but for anyone interested in a time when the dead wouldn't stay dead."-Booklist
I grew up religious but loving scary things—horror movies, scary comic books, Dark Shadows, andThe Twilight Zone. Even the music of Alice Cooper. While I’m no longer religious, I have a doctorate in religious studies and I still have a fascination with media that cause fear. I also write horror stories. BeyondHoly HorrorI have written two more books on religion and horror and I read every book about this odd combination as soon as I can get my hands on it. I believe you should never judge people by their tastes in media—they can be decent folk even if they like horror.
Like most of the other authors on my list Joseph Laycock has written several books that address religion and horror. I picked this one because it is the first of his books that I read and it awakened me to several of his other titles.
Laycock, who is a professor of religion, writes in an engaging way and has a great sense for what is happening in the wider culture, particularly about occult concerns. Vampire books are a guilty pleasure of mine, so reading this author on this subject seems both a natural and a supernatural choice. The book discusses modern vampire societies in a clear-eyed and informative way.
This book, about real vampires and the communities they have formed, explores the modern world of vampirism in all its amazing variety.
Long before Dracula, people were fascinated by vampires. The interest has continued in more recent times with Anne Rice's Lestat novels, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the HBO series True Blood, and the immensely popular Twilight. But vampires are not just the stuff of folklore and fiction. Based upon extensive interviews with members of the Atlanta Vampire Alliance and others within vampire communities throughout the United States, this fascinating book looks at the details of real vampire life and…
I have written more than 20 non-fiction books on a wide range of topics. I was trained as a chemist and physicist, and as both an author and a journalist I am mostly concerned with the sciences and how they interact with the broader culture – with the arts, politics, philosophy, and society. Sometimes that interest takes me further afield, and in my new book The Modern Myths, I present a detailed look at seven tales that have taken on the genuine stature of myth, being retold again and again as vehicles for the fears, dreams, and anxieties of the modern age. Ranging from Robinson Crusoe to Batman, this list also inevitably includes Bram Stoker’s classic Dracula – leading him to examine how we have used the legend of the vampire in the past and present.
Although this book focuses on just the most famous vampire narrative of all, you don’t need to look far into Dracula to find universal vampire themes: sexuality, paranoia, misogyny, xenophobia, psychoanalysis, and the sacred power of blood. This collection of essays also sets Stoker’s tale within the wider context of the Victorian vampire boom, and looks at what became of his tale on stage and screen. It shows how Stoker was tapping into richer, deeper seams than even he realised, making Dracula “one of the most obsessional texts of all time, a black hole of the imagination”, in horror expert David Skal’s words. “The most frightening thing about Dracula’, says Skal, “is the strong probability that it meant far less to Bram Stoker than it has come to mean for us.”
Bram Stoker's Dracula is the most famous vampire in literature and film. This new collection of sixteen essays brings together a range of internationally renowned scholars to provide a series of pathways through this celebrated Gothic novel and its innumerable adaptations and translations. The volume illuminates the novel's various pre-histories, critical contexts and subsequent cultural transformations. Chapters explore literary history, Gothic revival scholarship, folklore, anthropology, psychology, sexology, philosophy, occultism, cultural history, critical race theory, theatre and film history, and the place of the vampire in Europe and beyond. These studies provide an accessible guide of cutting-edge scholarship to one of…
I’m Sarah J. Sover, and I adore smashing genres together, especially when there’s magic involved. My first book, Double-Crossing the Bridge, is a comedic fantasy about drunk trolls pulling a suicidal heist, and my new release, Fairy Godmurder is like Jessica Jones with sparkle. The novels are wildly different from each other, but they both exist in the crime-fantasy sphere, where I can delve deep into character motivations, explore wrongs in the world through a fantastical lens, and play with well-loved tropes, inverting and subverting in unexpected ways. I love that this is a growing genre, and I hope I get an influx of suggestions added to my own TBR tower because of this list!
After a near-death experience, PI Harper Blaine gains the ability to navigate the occult world of magic. But the realm between our world and the next is filled with monsters. Some are malicious, but some are looking to hire. The concept of the Grey is fascinating and slightly terrifying to me. Harper deserves to be on this list because only a true badass could survive her client list.
Meet Harper Blaine. She also sees dead people...Harper Blaine is a small-time private investigator trying to earn a living when a low-life savagely assaults her, leaving her for dead. For two minutes, to be precise. When Harper comes to in the hospital, she begins to feel a bit ...strange. She sees things that can only be described as weird-shapes emerging from a foggy grey mist, snarling teeth, creatures roaring. But Harper's not crazy. Her "death" has made her a Greywalker - able to move between our world and the mysterious, cross-over zone where things that go bump in the night…
I’ve been obsessed with fantasy stories for as long as I can remember, but the books I read growing up usually took place “somewhere else.” When I first started seeing books that brought magic to a world that resembled mine, I fell in love. Reading magic in a modern setting brought it home and made it real. Now, I gobble up every story I can find that brings magic to the mundane, and I even write my own. I hope the books on this list inspire you to look for the magic in your own life, as they have for me.
This book holds a very special place in my heart because this is the book I was reading on the day I decided to become an author. The way the characters, world-building, mythos, and action came together in this story was pure magic, and I wanted more.
I’ve since read the entire series, though it’s ongoing, and I haven’t been disappointed. The heart and soul of this book is how much the main character cares about her friends and how far she will go to keep them safe. Joining Mercy’s pack, even for just a few pages at a time, feels like coming home.
The third novel in the international No. 1 bestselling Mercy Thompson series - the major urban fantasy hit of the decade
'I love these books!' Charlaine Harris
'The best new fantasy series I've read in years' Kelley Armstrong
MERCY THOMPSON: MECHANIC, SHAPESHIFTER, FIGHTER
It wasn't hard to follow the scent of blood to the living room where the fae had been killed. It had been a violent death, perfect for creating ghosts.
Mercy Thompson enjoys life as a mechanic, but life is never simple given her increasing closeness to the local werewolf pack, and her ability to change into coyote…
I’ve always had a wild imagination and have been creative and expressive through various art forms since I was young. After a series of crazy and vivid dreams, I decided to turn them into a story. One thing led to another, and before I knew it, I had over 20 projects, each with a different style but all with my voice. I grew up in Cheshire and studied digital media at the University of Bradford, but moved to my paternal home in Spain in 2009, where I now teach English and moonlight as a fantasy author.
Vampires, shifters, and reincarnation; I’ll read that again and again and again. It’s like if A Walk to Remember met The Mortal Instruments with a dash of Twilight. This was a fun read that I sailed through far too quickly.
Each character had their own mini story which makes this book a well-rounded story with a main focus but also intriguing characters. With the female main character having a fatal disease, and the male main character being immortal, the desperation to hang onto each other makes for a rare romance.
Take a story inspired by Black Dagger Brotherhood's vampires, add a dash of a modern twist on A Court of Thorns and Roses/Throne of Glass and a splash of Greek mythology and you get Of Shadow and Moonlight. Vampires, Monsters, Greek Mythology, Gods, Magic, Heartbreak, and more!
A woman fated to die young, a man cursed to live forever, and a darkness that threatens to destroy everything they love.
Cassie was never able to experience the life that many take for granted, the freedom to dictate her own journey. No, her life had been spent sheltered, protected from an inevitable…
I’ve loved Vampire Romance themes since I was a teenager. They were all over the house, with my mum and my sister both reading them too, all part of our home library. I can’t count how many series and standalone books I’ve read, but I don’t foresee it ever stopping. Whilst I am also a fan of fantasy and sci-fi, I love the romance factor in Paranormal books. As a result, I find them to be best suited for my mood. I not only read paranormal romance but write it and have dabbled in researching backgrounds on the myths of vampires, which led me to read vampire novels that integrate fiction and speculation.
I found this book funny and different from what I expected.
There is a love triangle, suspense, and a twist between the three characters, which I found refreshing too.
It’s got that ‘new age’ feeling to it, based on a dating app, but with a delicious twist.
Something that also caught my eye was that it is a standalone, so it's perfect if you just want a vampire romance to read and leave it at that. I usually read series, so it was nice to not have to mentally prepare myself to dive into a sequel.
Dating apps are hard, at least for 26-year-old Aurora Lopez, who feels like her love life and career are both going nowhere fast. After a string of eighteen first dates in less than four months, Aurora has had enough of dating. Out on her luck and running out of patience, a friend manages to persuade her into one last effort at finding Mr. Right on an app called Love Bites. I mean, why couldn't this dating app work for her? Her friend's coworker's best friend's cousin had success with it, or was it her friend's cousin's best friend's coworker? Either…
