10 paranormal novels for women

If you are caught up in the vampire or werewolf popular culture and the Twilight series just ain’t doing it for you, check out our list of steamy paranormal novels that will blow your socks off!

1. Cassandra Palmer series, by Karen Chance

This series follows the life of Cassie Palmer, a powerful clairvoyant, who has the ability to communicate with the spirit realm and see the future. When a vampire from her past whom she escaped from years ago returns with a vengeance, she has no choice but to seek protection from the vampire senate. The undead senators won’t help her for nothing, so she finds herself working for their most powerful senate members and so happens that one of them is just so irresistibly seductive…

2. Dorina Basarab (Midnight’s Daughter) series, by Karen Chance

Karen Chance takes us to a new corner of Cassie Palmer’s universe. This series is about Dory Basarab who is a dhampir -- half human and half vampire. Subject to uncontrollable rages, most dhampirs lives are very short. So far, Dory’s sanity is still intact and only unleashes her anger to demons and vampires that deserve killing. Now Dory’s father has come back into her life. Her Uncle Dracula (yes, the Dracula) has escaped his prison and her father wants Dory to work with the gorgeous master vampire Louis-Cesare to put him back there. Vampires and dhampirs are mortal enemies, and Dory prefers to work alone. But Dracula is the only thing on earth that truly scares her. So if Dory has to go up against him, she’ll take all the help she can get.

3. Sookie Stackhouse (Southern Vampire) series, by Charlaine Harris

If you are a fan of the hit HBO television series, True Blood, these are the books the show is based on. Charlaine Harris has created an alternate world where the invention of synthetic blood has made it unnecessary for vampires to feed on humans for sustenance, allowing the vampire community to reveal its existence to humans. The series is narrated by Sookie Stackhouse, a waitress and telepath in the town of Bon Temps when she meets the vampire of her dreams, Bill Compton, and one her co-workers is killed. The killings go on, and in order to stop her new vampire boyfriend being arrested for the murders and to avoid being the next victim herself, she starts to use her telepathic ability to try find the killer.

4. Mercy Thompson series, by Patricia Briggs

The Mercedes Thompson series follows the adventures of Mercy Thompson, a Native American shapeshifter who was raised by werewolves. The series is set in the Tri-Cities area of Washington State and in an alternate world where werewolves and certain types of fae have been revealed to the public. Mercy is a VW mechanic by trade and she learns of her true nature and is caught up in the affairs of the local werewolf pack, led by Adam, the (hot!) Alpha who lives next door, and the local vampire seethe, a member of which she has befriended.

5. Alpha and Omega series, by Patricia Briggs

This series is set in the same world as the Mercedes Thompson series, but in a slightly earlier time. The series actually starts with a novella titled ‘Alpha and Omega’ which was published in ‘On the Prowl’ anthology, which is a short story on how the story in the later books began. We learn of the violent way of how Anna Latham became a werewolf and of her horrible experience in the Chicago pack. But when she discovers wrongdoing in her pack, she has to go to above her Alpha to find help. That’s where she meets Charles Cornick, the son of the leader of the North American werewolves and discovers that she’s a rare Omega wolf and that he’s her mate. In the first book of the Alpha and Omega series, ‘Cry Wolf’, the story takes off from when Charles brings Anna back to Montana to understand the mate connection of their wolves which has not yet bonded as humans. They also go on a dangerous mission to find a rogue wolf and a witch with a century old connection with the oldest wolf in the pack. Anna learns of the power of the pack bond as well as the power of being an Omega wolf.

6. Rachel Morgan (The Hollows) series, by Kim Harrison

The underground population of witches, vampires and werewolves has lived beside humans for centuries, hiding their powers. But after a genetically engineered virus wipes out a large part of humanity, many of the “Inderlanders" reveal themselves, changing everything. Rachel Morgan, witch and bounty hunter with the Inderland Runner Services, is one of the best at apprehending supernatural lawbreakers. But when it comes to following the rules, she falls desperately short. Determined to buck the system, she quits and takes off with an I.S. contract on her head and is reluctantly forced to team up with Ivy, Inderland\'s best runner . . . and a living vampire. To clear her name, Rachel must evade shape-changing assassins, outwit a powerful businessman/crime lord, and survive a vicious underground fight-to-the-death . . . not to mention her own roommate.

7. Kitty Norville series, by Carrie Vaughn

The series follows Kitty Norville, a werewolf and a late-night radio DJ for a popular syndicated radio phone-in based in Denver called ‘The Midnight Hour’. She accidentally starts a late-night talk show about werewolves, vampires, and other mythical creature which became a raging success. But Kitty is the one who needs some help with one sexy werewolf-hunter and a few homicidal undead on her tail. Kitty may have just bitten off more than she can chew…

8. Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series, by Laurell K Hamilton

This series follows Anita Blake who lives in a world where vampires, zombies and werewolves have been declared legal citizens of the United States. Anita is an “animator" – a profession that involves raising the dead for mourning relatives. But Anita is also known as a fearsome hunter of criminal vampires and is often employed to investigate cases that are far too much for the conventional police. But when Anita gains the attention of the vampire masters from her hometown St. Louis, she also risks revealing an intriguing secret about herself – the source of her unusual strength and power.

9. Otherworld (Sisters of the Moon) series, by Yasmine Galenorn

The series is about three half human, half Fae sisters who are wild and sexy members of the OIA – the Otherworld Intelligence Agency. Camille, a witch; Delilah, a werecat; and Menolly, an acrobat extraordinaire turned vampire are sent to Earth to keep them out of trouble by their superiors, who consider the girls nothing but a bunch of bumbling half-breeds. But the girls soon find themselves smack in the middle of Demon-Central when Shadow Wing, the leader of the Subterranean Realms, decides to attempt a coup on both Earth and Otherworld. From their home in a seedy suburb of Seattle, the sisters must use every ounce of erratic power they have to prevent the demons from taking over and attempt to save two worlds, one monster at a time.

10. World of Lupi series, by Eileen Wilks

Eileen Wilks begins the story in the ‘Lover Beware’ anthology entitled ‘Only Human’. In it Lily Yu is a Chinese-American detective working in the city of San Diego on a grisly murder that appears to be the work of a werewolf. But if she wants to find out who the killer is, she’ll have to get inside the clans. She enlists the help of a were named Rule Turner, a prince of the Lupi, who is a charismatic presence who disturbs Lily. Logic and honour demand she keep her distance, but the attraction between them is immediate, devastating, and beyond human reason. The first official book in the World of Lupi series is ‘Tempting Danger’ which expands on the story told in ‘Only Human’ and ends up taking the characters in different directions than the original short story.