Author: Richelle Mead
# of Pages: 332 (paperback)
Genre: YA, Paranormal, Fantasy
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Synopsis: Lissa Dragomir is a Moroi princess: a mortal vampire with a rare gift for harnessing the earth's magic. She must be protected at all times from Strigoi; the fiercest vampires - the ones who never die. The powerful blend of human and vampire blood that flows through Rose Hathaway, Lissa's best friend, makes her a dhampir. Rose is dedicated to a dangerous life of protecting Lissa from the Strigoi, who are hell-bent on making Lissa one of them.
After two years of freedom, Rose and Lissa are caught and dragged back to St. Vladimir's Academy, a school for vampire royalty and their guardians-to-be, hidden in the deep forests of Montana. But inside the iron gates, life is even more fraught with danger... and the Strigoi are always close by.
Rose and Lissa must navigate their dangerous world, confront the temptations of forbidden love, and never once let their guard down, lest the evil undead make Lissa one of them forever...
Review: I was a little surprised when I saw the average rating on Goodreads was 4.15 stars. Whenever I see the word "vampire" in the title, and the book is young adult, my expectations drop A LOT. I was expecting (without reading the synopsis) a female teenage vampire protagonist who attends an academy (duh) and falls in love with some hot guy. It's the basic young adult vampire romance format.
But I was kinda wrong. The romance bit with the protagonist wasn't as big of a component as I thought it would. Instead, I found there was some kind of womance (like a bromance?) going on between Lissa and Rose. I know they're best friends and all, but I mean they were closer than normal, even with the paranormal-fantasy aspect of their characters. But, hey, you do you. It's just not what I was expecting nor was it what I really was interested in reading about. I was all ready to read a cheesy romance novel, but I guess that's what happens when I don't read the synopsis.
I didn't particularly care for the protagonist, Rose. She's not someone I can admire or even relate to...and her ignorance was mildly irritating. Sometimes she just doesn't know certain facts that I would hope everyone at her age would know. Some examples:
"'I had to do a report on Russia and the R.S.S.R.'" (122).
"'Was...was there anything else?' [Rose] stammered. He shook his head. 'No. You probably need some primary sources, but we don't have any here.' 'Primary what?'" (136).The plot lacked structure. Every once in a while, I would ask myself, "What's the point in all of this? What's this leading up to?" It's really just a slice of life type of book but paranormal fantasy style that has an exciting conclusion that I wasn't really expecting.
One of the less interesting books I've read recently, but still somewhat entertaining. I'm hoping that the series will improve as it goes along since I've heard so many good things about Vampire Academy and Bloodlines. If your on the fence, I suppose I would recommend it. I'm not even sure myself at the moment.
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