I thought I’d join up with the Friday 56 this week with a twist.

A while back I thought it would be clever to do vampire-themed posts on Fridays, co-hosted by Draculaura, my doll Friday here.

In that spirit, tonight I’m going to tell you about a couple recent vampire-themed books I’ve read!

I’ve recently rediscovered the genre after a long break and am having fun reading the new stuff that’s there.

Briefly, the Friday 56 rules are easy.

Grab a book, any book.

Turn to page 56, or 56% in your eReader.

Find a sentence (or a few, just don’t spoil it)

Post it.

Then join the link up.

As a note, in rediscovering vampire fiction, I also finally figured out how to use my eReader, so both of these were e-reads.

They are also both of the YA genre and, as many of you must know, trying to find a vampire book in the YA section is about as challenging as trying to find pink clothing for your preschool daughter.

I’ve recently caught up on some of the newer YA vampire series and have truly enjoyed both P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast’s House of Night Series and Richelle Mead’s Vampire Academy.

With that under my belt, I’m now heading out further into YA vampire fictionland and, wow, there’s a lot.

But here’s two recent finds:

1. Xoe: or Vampires, and Werewolves, and Demons, Oh My! by Sara C. Roethle (2009)

56% on my eReader brings me about here:

Finally alone, I took a moment to process the events of the previous night and this morning. It was a lot to take in: werewolves, vampires, and whatever I was. That last part was by far the most troubling to me, not that the others were unimportant, far from it. My world was completely and utterly upside-down.

If that’s enough to grab you, you can download the book (first of four in the series) for free from her website.

I was excited to find a new vampire book to read (for free!) and I think it’s a good start to the genre for younger readers.

2. The Vampire Stalker by Allison van Diepen (2011) 

As a quick note, I went to high school with the author. She always wanted to be a writer, and went out and did it.

From about 56% in my eReader:

Has anyone ever told you that your behaviour can be a little extreme?”

“I’ve heard it a time or two.” A grin pulled at the corner of his mouth. “But I’m not perturbed by your criticism, since you are already in love with me, Mrs. Alexander Banks eight thousand and twenty-one.

So this was a vampire story with an added enjoyable twist playing with the fantasy of “What if your favourite character was real and showed up in your life?” In this case, vampire hunter Alexander Banks from the best-selling series “Otherworld” somehow jumps from the story into Amy’s Chicago while hunting the story’s main bad vamp, who has also jumped into real life. Amy, a huge Alexander Bank’s fan, finds herself helping her fictional crush and hero.

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Anyone have any other suggested vampire reads for me?

My to-read list grows daily and I think I’m going to set the serious and high brow goal of hitting over 100 books on “My Vampire Obsession” reading list (currently at 71).

As a note, failure to suggest something makes little Mavis here sad.

And you don’t really want to upset Dracula’s (other) daughter.

Happy Friday!