A year ago I spent 5 straight days in my room binge reading the Vampire Academy series. That's right, 6 books in 5 days. It was the craziest binge I had ever been on and honestly I have no regrets about it and it's so scary to think that although a year has already passed, the series is honestly still so fresh in my head. I am now finally reading the Bloodlines series, it's spin off series (also, it's the books getting me out of this slump). It's been a year but I never really wrote a review on the whole series. I have a draft where I basically fangirled about the series for about 1, 500 words and the draft isn't done yet but I honestly was not about to go through and post that. It's way too fucking long oh my lord. So, I decided to just kind of just write a new post about the series, shorter, and not as spoilery. It's been a whole year since the binge so this is a perfect time for this post. I'll try not to ramble on for too long.

Here is a little backstory. It was summer, the day before my birthday and me and my sister were bored as hell. So we decided to watch a movie and what did we choose? Vampire Academy. I just rewatched the movie and now that I look back on it, no wonder they never picked it up for a second movie. It was just...not the best. At the time though, I was super intrigued by the movie so I decided to see what this book was about. Fast forward, 5 days later and Kaitlin has finished the series and was shook af.

What initially kept me so hooked with this series is how great the general storyline is. I love the world this takes place, how much depth it had, which gave Mead a lot of space to create her storyline. Honestly this series took so many turns I was totally not expecting and each book really got better and better. With the title of "Vampire Academy" you would expect all 6 books to be about vampires bitching around at a high school but oh my lord. Each book the author really built onto the storyline and each book was so addicting. It also did not help that every single damn book basically ended in a cliff hanger so I had no control when it came to immediately reaching for the next book after finishing the previous one. The fact that Richelle Mead knows exactly when to fuck shit up is such a big reason why I love these books so much and why they're so addicting. Unfortunately, I won't talk too much about that because if I did I would reveal every single plot twits but trust me the rollercoasters within this series are very serious. Very.

Not only is the storyline so good but the books mature in a way as Rose matures. In the beginning she isn't immature, but she is very young, as she should be considering she is a teenager unknown to how dangerous her world is. So many things are thrown at her way by the end of the series and because of that she had become so much more mature. Along with that, the books become more and more serious. It looses it's "carefree teenagers" vibe and I didn't find that a bad thing at all because it made sense. Rose experienced so much through the 6 books, if it didn't loose those vibes then it wouldn't represent Rose's growth as well as it should. (Lightweight sad though because it just shows how much had changed between those 6 books) It was exactly like when you finish the 6th season of a show and for fun, go back to the 1st season and see what's changed. When you go back to the 1st season though, you realize that half the characters are dead, the main character is a whole new person, and you kind of just wonder,"What happened?" I guess that was me just now, as I watched the first movie and thought of everything that would happen afterwards. The characters mature, the storyline get's better and more complex, and I honestly think that's why I love it so much. I'm pretty sure I would have loved a 6 books series based on a whole bunch of high school drama but it would have definitely been less memorable compared to how Vampire Academy is to me now.

And not only do the characters change through the series, they do it together. They endure so much through everything but what I love is how through it all, they stick with each other. Yeah, there are definitely bumps here and there but they're all so dedicated to each other, which is one of the reasons why I love the characters in this series. They're all different in their own way. And don't even get me started on the romances oh my god! Going into this series I already knew the couples but I didn't expect half the shit they would experience. And they're just so cute. There is nothing better than cute romance and that's one a small reason why I love this series so much.

Yes, I know this series has been out for ages which is probably why you should get on with and read it. It isn't as big as The Hunger Games or Divergent but oh my lordy to me it's even better than both those trilogies (IMO). If you looking for a long binge, pick up Vampire Academy. It's not as bad as the series title makes it seem. And who knows, you may fall for it as hard as I did. Read it for the great plot, or the characters, or the romance, or the world, or the humor, or *just* read it. Please, thanks :)

Vampire Academy