Author: Richelle Mead
Genre: YA Paranormal Romance
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Format that I used: ebook
My Overall Thoughts: Seems Very Intriguing!
When I first saw Vampire Academy, I wasn't sure that I would like it. Now, Don't Get me wrong, I love Fantasy Fiction as much as the next person, but this was a Young Adult Fantasy, and I haven't been mistaken for a teenager in quite some time. So, I really didn't think that I would like this book. I decided to give it a try, but I didn't have high hopes for it. I figured it was going to be a little on the "immature" side, but thought it would be something to read just to past the time.
BOY, WAS I WRONG! I was intrigued by this book from beginning to end! I absolutely loved everything about this book! True, the book is about teenagers in high school, but with all of the drama, secrets, lies, budding romances, and thrilling action, this book had me on the edge of my seat and such suspense filled content that it was anything but you average teenage story.
Rose Hathaway is a reckless, loudmouthed, take-no-crap-from-anyone kind of person. She is a dhampir,(half human, and half moroi) and training to one day be the guardian to her best friend Lisa. Dhampirs are usually taller, stronger, and faster than morois, and even humans are, which makes them good at fighting strigoi (blood thirsty, evil vampires that kill people by drinking them to death.) and protecting the moroi from them.
Vasilisa (Lisa) Dragomir is a moroi (vampire) princess who is timid, reasonable, and always tries to think things through before acting. Lisa is part of the Royal family and is the last surviving Dragomir, which makes her very valuable and precious to all moroi and dhampirs alike.
The story starts out with Rose and Lisa on the run from St. Vladimir's school (a special kind of school that helps dhampirs and morois learn and improve their skills.) However, they quickly get captured by the school's guardians and are brought back to St. Vladimir's. Upon returning, Rose finds out that while they were away, she missed out on two years of important guardian training and has to do extra training sessions with Dimitri, one of the school's guardians, in order to be caught up enough to graduate with the rest of her class.
We watch Rose as she figures out that even though she may be 17 years old, she is training to become a guardian and will one day be protecting someone's life, which means that she has to grow up a lot faster than most teenagers if she wants to be the one that protects Lisa after graduation. With the help of Dimitri, Rose quickly realizes that she can not act as wild and care free as she once has.
We also get to see that while Lisa may be the quiet and controlled one, she will also do anything for her best friend.While Rose may be training to be Lisa's protector, we quickly find out that Lisa is just as devoted to protecting Rose. Lisa's character also goes through quite a transformation and it was very interesting to watch her character adapt to life back in school.
I loved how well developed all of the characters were. I felt like I actually knew every character in this book. Richelle Mead did such a great job at describing her characters. She made sure that everyone had a rich, unique personality. She also did a great job on the general description of the character. I knew what everyone looked like, and I was so captivated by the characters, that after reading the book for a little while, I felt like I could actually see what facial expressions they were making during certain events, without Mead even having to describe it. I laughed with the characters, I cried with characters, I even had small crushes on the characters (yeah, that's right I had crushes on fictional characters, but read the book before you go and think I am completely crazy... your opinion might change).
Another thing I like about this book was how well written and well thought out the entire book was. There was mystery, action, and romance (even some forbidden romance, which is truly the best kind!) All of the scenes seemed to flow very smoothly. None of the book seemed rushed or just thrown together at the last minuet just so the book will have more content. At first, I was a little confused about the different types of vampires, and the Dhampirs, but I thought that Mead did a great job at explaining the different groups of people in a way that was easy to understand.
Having read the entire series already, I can tell you that this book has more "Young Adult" content and situations than any other book in this series, but this book gives you a good introduction to the characters and even gives you small glimpse of their past so you can better understand why they act the way the do. This book is definitely a good start to a great series, and I recommend anyone who is a fan of paranormal romance to give it a try.
This review was written by Tracy Richards
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