Thursday Thirteen: 13 Books for Twilight Fans
So, I was talking with Lisa (who won Evermore in my contest) about books appropriate for teens who liked Twilight. And I thought I would post a list of some of them here.
Now, first of all, a disclaimer. I have not read the Twilight series. So I can only guess what its fans will like. However, from what I’ve heard, I think these would be good choices.
Another note, I am always in favor of parents test-reading a book before giving it to their teens. My parents did this to a large degree, and if when I have kids I will do the same.
- The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong (Darkest Powers trilogy book 1)
- Glass Houses by Rachel Caine (The Morganville Vampires series book 1)
- Alanna: The First Adventure by Tamora Pierce (Song of the Lioness book 1)
- The Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander (starts with The Book of Three)
- The Spiderwick Chronicles by Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi (starts with The Field Guide)
- Sorcery and Cecilia: or The Enchanted Chocolate Pot by Patricia C. Wrede and Carolyn Stevermer
- The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper (first in The Dark is Rising Sequence)
- Dragonsong by Anne McCaffrey (book 1 of the Harper Hall trilogy in the Pern books… technically it’s the second trilogy, I think, but this one is more teen oriented than the first trilogy)
- Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder (But… I would double-check this one before giving it to a teen, and I would probably recommend it for older teens. It continues into a trilogy that trends towards more adult themes in the second and third books.)
- The Rowan by Anne McCaffrey (book 1 in The Tower and the Hive series. Again, I would save this one for older teens.)
- The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis (and I refuse to go with the new numbering. Start with book 1 – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.)
- The Buried Pyramid by Jane Lindskold (I think this is a stand-alone. And it seems like a historical fantasy at first, and then… well. I enjoyed it, but it was a bit of a shock that there was fantasy in the second half of the book.)
- The Serpent’s Shadow and Phoenix and Ashes by Mercedes Lackey (books 1 & 3 in the Elemental Masters series… These two are loosely connected and should be read in order (as in, read #1 before #3), but the others in the series so far don’t seem related at all.)
A side note: most of these have girls as the main characters. The ones that don’t (or that have multiple main characters with sufficient stage time for the guys) are #s 4, 5, 7, & 11. Not that guys can’t enjoy books about girls. But I know sometimes that makes a difference.
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Happy Thursday, and happy reading!
Nicole- Is it Thursday already?
My son was hooked on the Barf-o-rama series- now sadly out of print.
Now he reads Maximum PC and truck magazines.
Hmm, I don’t think my parents prescreened any books for me. Of course, my brother and I alternately joke that we raised ourselves or that we were raised by wolves.
Charles de Lint has a few YA-oriented books, such as The Blue Girl and Dingo.
I just finished the first book of the Twilight series. I found it quite entertaining. What a great idea to create a list of books that may also be interesting. It’s always good to encourage reading for young people!
What a great idea Nikki! I also really like your encouragement to parents to pre-read the books for their kids. My parents did this some, but as I got older they didn’t so much…luckily the values that they taught me pretty much stuck. I do this for my own kids now:-)
Oh, by the way I just found the book Dragonsong and was going to start reading it soon. I haven’t read the Pern books in a while.
Talk to you soon,
Sommer
You could add Jennifer Scales and the Ancient Furnace to your list. It’s by MaryJanice Davidson and her husband… I forget his name (it’s not like her Betsy series at all). It’s pretty good for adults, but best for teens.
Hey, thanks for the list! I’ve been on a YA reading kick lately… and have totally enjoyed “Fell” by David Clement Davies, and also (though not so much) “The Sight”, either the first book or a prequel. I also very much liked the Oracle trilogy by Catherine Fisher. Prescreening is a good idea, but I don’t always do it… to my great chagrine, I let the kiddo (when he was maybe 9) read a Yu-gi-oh graphic novel, that was rated TEEN, and had images of guns and smoking and gambling and maybe worse, I can’t remember… but he did give me a fair amount of good – natured grief that I gave him the book and had no idea what was in it.
I like to read what the girls are reading too. I think it is ok to tell them when they have to wait a bit longer to read a book. We listened to Twilight on the way home from MI in the car, and now my 10 year old wants to read the rest, but I think she should wait a bit (esp for Breaking Dawn – that one is definitely a teen book.) I think my mom should have done that more when we were growing up as she thought that because one Judy Blume was ok, they all were!
BTW, another good teen vampire book is The Society of S by Susan Hubbard.