Basically, young adult and/or vampire novels aren’t my thing anymore. There are so many cases when the books failed to keep me thrilled along the way. For example, I can’t finish Charlaine Harris books, and I even bother to buy the hardcopy. Also Twilight Series and Vampire Knight still annoys me with its storyline, heroines, the ending, etc, so I need you to understand about why did I keep avoid Vampire Academy in the past years. The title itself managed to creeps the heck out of me. But finally, several days ago I started to read the book since I stuck with nothing new to make me excited. I could finish it faster if only the font isn’t in the red color with black background (see, I read it in my hand-phone like usual). I just finished the first book and halfway finishing the second. Now, I have to admit that I have to stop judging books based on its creature (hehe). Vampires aren’t that bad after all (but no—not the sparkly one).
Just like the title, Vampire Academy revolves in the world where vampires do exist. Our heroine is Rose Hathaway, a novice guardian with half human half vampire blood (it makes her a Dhampir). She’s strong, short tempered, impulsive but very loyal to Lissa, a Moroi Princess (moroi is a mortal vampire with an unbreakable bond to the earth's magic) and her bestfriend at the same time. For some reason Rose and Lissa run away from St. Vladimir’s Academy but they are caught and dragged back to academy. Once again Rose and Lissa caught in the vortex of Moroi society, their politics, their secretive nature and unspeakable rituals. Rose can’t let her guard down. She has to protect Lissa not only from other moroi but also from strigoi (undead vampires) who wants to make her one of them.
I think, a book, especially like this one, need one strong hero or heroin or enemy to be a good one. Hero/heroine character especially will determine the future of the book. I mean, no matter how popular a book is, if the book has a weak heroin struggling for something too lame, people get tired. The book would quickly forgotten, or worse, gain a huge wave of antis. Vampire Academy thankfully has a badass heroin with many flaws but managed to improve herself in every book. The storyline is pretty good. Sometimes too predictable, sometimes caught me by surprise. There are some puzzles, some adrenalin, some fight scenes, some blood, and its just complete the book. There are some minus points of course. Like the male character rather boring for my taste or the way the enemy rather undefined clearly and it could confuse some reader, but well, nothing perfect in life. Overall, I enjoyed the book more than I expected. I will rate Vampire Academy four out of five stars.
