Helpful Score: 1
I think Id rate this about 3.5 stars because it just didnt quite make it there for me to round it up to a 4.
The setting of this story is St. Vladimirs Academy, which as you can tell from the title of the book, is a school exclusively for vampires. The school is in Montana, which isnt the most glamorous location in the world, but I suppose I can see the reasoning for that. The main character, Rose, is a dhampir - a half-human/half-vampire mix. Dhampir exist in this world to protect the Moroi, the mortal vampires who can control elemental magic, from the Strigoi, the undead, immortal vampires. There arent many dhampir and even less Moroi from what I can tell, and its usually the males who train to become guardians. Guardians are essentially just bodyguards assigned to (or chosen by) certain Moroi. Rose is one of the rare female guardians-in-training. Two years ago she and her best friend, Lissa, ran away from the academy, but the novel starts with them being caught and taken back. Now, even though theyre in the place where they should be safest, danger seems to be lurking around every corner. Rose divides her time between trying to protect Lissa, training with her ultra-hot mentor, Dimitri, and gossiping/being gossiped about. It really was just like high schoolwith vampires. Magical vampires.
As with Richelle Meads other work (Ive read all of the books in the Georgina Kincaid series so far), the mystery element was really weak. I suspected the villains early on, so the end wasnt much of a surprise. Maybe it was because this series is geared toward a younger audience, but I think even if Id read this when I was a teenager, it still wouldnt have been difficult to guess who the baddies were because Meads clues are subtle like a slap in the face. They might as well just write CLUE in the margin whenever she decides to drop a hint.
I dont necessarily mind predictability to a certain extent - sometimes its gratifying to reach the end and find out you were right, or to come across an author who throws in a twist and manages to surprise you - but my biggest issue with the lack of subtly is that sometimes it makes the characters seem kind of stupid when they dont pick up things that the reader sees as blatantly obvious. So later on when they finally start to put things together youre like, Well, duh, I figured that out 70 pages ago. Still, the book was entertaining so I enjoyed it overall.
Oddly enough, though I did like Rose and Lissa, my favorite characters wound up being Dimitri and Christian. Ive read reviews questioning Dimitris attraction to Rose, but I can see it. Shes beautiful, shes brave - brashly so, but nevertheless - and shes incredibly loyal. Yeah, sometimes shes a hothead, but Im willing to cut her some slack because shes only seventeen. When I was her age, I was nearly as dramatic and boy crazyand Ive always had a bit of a temper. Besides, Ive read plenty of books featuring adult protagonists who seemed much more immature than Rose. As for Roses attraction to Dimitri, who could really blame the girl? Then again, I do seem to have a penchant for hot, tall men with Russian accents. ;)
Im definitely going to read the next book in the series and see how things go from there. Despite the fact that the mystery/suspense element isnt Meads strongest suit, I like her style and she has interesting ideas. I do hope that the quality of the books stays more consistent in this series than in the Georgina Kincaid series, though, because those have been all over the place for me. I guess in a way this series will be a deciding factor in whether or not I choose to read anything else by this author in the future. One thing that I really cant stand is when a series starts out strong and then none of the subsequent books live up to the standard set by the first. Ive seen this happen in a few series and its just really disappointing. Not that I expect every book to be perfect - there are bound to be books that I like more than others in any given series - but there are times when the quality from one book to another is so disparate that it seems like they could have been written by different authors. In those cases, to save both my time and money, I think its better to just give up. Hopefully that doesnt happen this time around.
On a completely random note, it annoys me that the girl on the front cover, who I assume is supposed to be Rose, doesnt at all match the description of Rose in the book. I hate it when publishers do that.
The setting of this story is St. Vladimirs Academy, which as you can tell from the title of the book, is a school exclusively for vampires. The school is in Montana, which isnt the most glamorous location in the world, but I suppose I can see the reasoning for that. The main character, Rose, is a dhampir - a half-human/half-vampire mix. Dhampir exist in this world to protect the Moroi, the mortal vampires who can control elemental magic, from the Strigoi, the undead, immortal vampires. There arent many dhampir and even less Moroi from what I can tell, and its usually the males who train to become guardians. Guardians are essentially just bodyguards assigned to (or chosen by) certain Moroi. Rose is one of the rare female guardians-in-training. Two years ago she and her best friend, Lissa, ran away from the academy, but the novel starts with them being caught and taken back. Now, even though theyre in the place where they should be safest, danger seems to be lurking around every corner. Rose divides her time between trying to protect Lissa, training with her ultra-hot mentor, Dimitri, and gossiping/being gossiped about. It really was just like high schoolwith vampires. Magical vampires.
As with Richelle Meads other work (Ive read all of the books in the Georgina Kincaid series so far), the mystery element was really weak. I suspected the villains early on, so the end wasnt much of a surprise. Maybe it was because this series is geared toward a younger audience, but I think even if Id read this when I was a teenager, it still wouldnt have been difficult to guess who the baddies were because Meads clues are subtle like a slap in the face. They might as well just write CLUE in the margin whenever she decides to drop a hint.
I dont necessarily mind predictability to a certain extent - sometimes its gratifying to reach the end and find out you were right, or to come across an author who throws in a twist and manages to surprise you - but my biggest issue with the lack of subtly is that sometimes it makes the characters seem kind of stupid when they dont pick up things that the reader sees as blatantly obvious. So later on when they finally start to put things together youre like, Well, duh, I figured that out 70 pages ago. Still, the book was entertaining so I enjoyed it overall.
Oddly enough, though I did like Rose and Lissa, my favorite characters wound up being Dimitri and Christian. Ive read reviews questioning Dimitris attraction to Rose, but I can see it. Shes beautiful, shes brave - brashly so, but nevertheless - and shes incredibly loyal. Yeah, sometimes shes a hothead, but Im willing to cut her some slack because shes only seventeen. When I was her age, I was nearly as dramatic and boy crazyand Ive always had a bit of a temper. Besides, Ive read plenty of books featuring adult protagonists who seemed much more immature than Rose. As for Roses attraction to Dimitri, who could really blame the girl? Then again, I do seem to have a penchant for hot, tall men with Russian accents. ;)
Im definitely going to read the next book in the series and see how things go from there. Despite the fact that the mystery/suspense element isnt Meads strongest suit, I like her style and she has interesting ideas. I do hope that the quality of the books stays more consistent in this series than in the Georgina Kincaid series, though, because those have been all over the place for me. I guess in a way this series will be a deciding factor in whether or not I choose to read anything else by this author in the future. One thing that I really cant stand is when a series starts out strong and then none of the subsequent books live up to the standard set by the first. Ive seen this happen in a few series and its just really disappointing. Not that I expect every book to be perfect - there are bound to be books that I like more than others in any given series - but there are times when the quality from one book to another is so disparate that it seems like they could have been written by different authors. In those cases, to save both my time and money, I think its better to just give up. Hopefully that doesnt happen this time around.
On a completely random note, it annoys me that the girl on the front cover, who I assume is supposed to be Rose, doesnt at all match the description of Rose in the book. I hate it when publishers do that.
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