The Vampire Academy
Richelle Mead
7 Stars
I went into this series thinking that I was going to like it but probably not love it, just because it is a much younger style than I normally read and while I know I would have been crazy about the series as a young teen, I do find some of the 16 year old girl choices and voices annoying now.
It went pretty much the way, enjoyable and relaxing, brought up some nostalgia about other vampire books I read between 12 - 15 that were similar. Great downtime books, the first audiobook had an amazing narrator, but as a whole the series was nothing crazy special.
We meet our cast of characters and their roles, Moroi, Stragoi, Dhampires, ect. Introduced to the school and its cliques and society. We learn about why Rose and Lisa are so special (why these two are our mains over the others), enter the love interests in Dimitri.
Very cookie cutter, so many cliches and stereotypes implemented. The plot was solid though and fast paced, the evil was a little too black and white even for a YA novel and I don't like how they classified these as vampires, I think it would have been better off leaving them as just Moroi and letting that be its own category. Letting the reader draw the rest of the conclusions themselves.
Book 2 : Frostbite
After the first book I wasn't really sure where we would be going and how they would stretch out one more year of school (this is "the academy" series after all) into another 5 books. I like the changes in the characters and how you can see them growing up. Nothing worse than static teens, who are some of the most fast changing age group in the boring real world let alone in a vampire / guardian / supernatural setting.
Book 3: Shadow Kissed
Things are still very interesting although I really don't like the love stories that we have going on. They are really bad examples of relationships, this is not what you want young girls to strive for in the boyfriend department. Too much glamourizing of older men and alcohol (which might be a reality of teenage years but I think it is all perpetuated by these kinds of representations)
Book 4 : Blood Promise, Book 5 : Spirit Bound, Book 6 : Last Sacrifice
Book 3 was the highpoint of the series, it was pretty much all downhill from there. Page after page of the same few things repeated over and over. The relationships in these books got more and more problematic. I don't even think I would have liked these 3 when I was a teen.
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