Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead

TL;DR ... it's a school for vampires

not on TBR

library ebook (no hold) 9/17/16

finished 9/20/16

That's probably my most eloquent TL;DR yet B) lol

I found Vampire Academy in my library's ebook catalog when I sat down and went through the entire thing to find every available book I could read. (I'm not kidding. It took me like two hours.) I figured since there weren't any holds on it, and it was almost a classic of sorts, I had no reason to try it out. 

I knew VA was on the older end of the YA genre, or at least what the genre has been during my time. I'm not sure if it's from before the Twilight fad or was caught up in that whole thing, but if I'd known about VA back then, I totally would've sided with it instead. 

VA was pretty easy to get through. The narration kept the story moving, and the non-action-y parts of their school lives was pretty glazed over. (Although I think that could be a little detrimental, depending on how you feel about the speed of the plot.) Rose was an interesting main character and despite my initial predictions, I would actually read more about her. 

The distinctions between the different types of vampirism was cool, but a little hard to keep track of at first, and I still feel like I don't have enough history to their world to understand how they got where they were. I'm pretty sure this is a big series, though, so I have a feeling that might get resolved by the end of it.

The rest of the characters were interesting as well, but I didn't feel like I got to know them quite well enough. All of the interactions we saw advanced the plot -- which, I mean, is good to have -- but it also didn't give much room to know them as people outside of the story surrounding Lissa. We didn't get to see much detail that made them feel human. 

(Though, I guess they aren't.) 

I was reading this concurrently (ish) with Soundless, which is a much newer book by Richelle Mead. (I didn't like that as much, unfortunately. I'll have a review up next month.) The first Vampire Academy book was promising enough that I'm willing to continue with the series, but I haven't added the next book to my TBR yet. 

TL;DR it was a solid three-star book for me and I think it's worth the try for most people, especially in the aftermath of the Twilight trend. 

On a related note, I'm wondering if it's worth it to try and track down this movie adaption the cover was talking about. I had no idea until I saw the little sticker on it.