The Vampire Diaries (novel series)
young adult fiction book series

The Vampire Diaries is a young adult vampire fiction series of novels created by American author L. J. Smith. The story centers on Elena Gilbert, a young human, and her life.
Publishing history
The series was originally published in 1991–1992 and it revolves around Stefan Salvatore and Elena Gilbert as the two main protagonists. The first three novels in the original series (The Awakening, The Struggle, and The Fury) all feature Stefan and Elena as the narrators of the series, while the last book in the original series, Dark Reunion, is from Bonnie McCullough's point of view
After taking a long hiatus from writing, Smith published the first installment of "The Return" trilogy, Nightfall, on February 10, 2009. Shadow Souls, the second book of "The Return" trilogy, was released on March 16, 2010. The third and final book of "The Return" trilogy, Midnight, was released on March 15, 2011.
The trilogy after The Return trilogy, The Hunters, was written by a ghostwriter. In fact, Smith signed a "work for hire" contract back when she had written the original Vampire Diaries novel trilogy, which means Alloy owns the copyrights to the series. Smith had originally intended to call the books in "The Hunters" trilogy Phantom, Evensong and Eternity, but the third book was called Destiny Rising by the ghostwriter. Phantom was released on October 25, 2011, Moonsong on March 13, 2012, and Destiny Rising on October 23, 2012.
The public source identifies “The Vampire Diaries (novel series)” as young adult fiction book series. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Vampire, Diaries and novel.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q226079. VIAF identifies the subject as 151145542660296641929. The Library of Congress control number is no2009157699. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1991, 1992, 2009 and 2010.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Vampire Diaries (novel series)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.