by Rebecca Maizel (website)
Published August 3rd by St.Martin’s Griffin
I listened to the audiobook version from audible
goodreads,amazon
(Paperback and audiobook version)
synopsis from goodreads
Lenah Beaudonte is, in many ways, your average teen: the new girl at Wickham Boarding School, she struggles to fit in enough to survive and stand out enough to catch the eye of the golden-boy lacrosse captain. But Lenah also just happens to be a recovering five-hundred-year-old vampire queen. After centuries of terrorizing Europe, Lenah is able to realize the dream all vampires have — to be human again. After performing a dangerous ritual to restore her humanity, Lenah entered a century-long hibernation, leaving behind the wicked coven she ruled over and the eternal love who has helped grant her deep-seated wish.
Until, that is, Lenah draws her first natural breath in centuries at Wickham and rediscovers a human life that bears little resemblance to the one she had known. As if suddenly becoming a teenager weren’t stressful enough, each passing hour brings Lenah closer to the moment when her abandoned coven will open the crypt where she should be sleeping and find her gone. As her borrowed days slip by, Lenah resolves to live her newfound life as fully as she can. But, to do so, she must answer ominous questions: Can an ex-vampire survive in an alien time and place? What can Lenah do to protect her new friends from the bloodthirsty menace about to descend upon them? And how is she ever going to pass her biology midterm?
This book was mesmerizing, it was absolutely captivating and it occupied my thoughts for the last three days. This is how long it took me to listen to the full audiobook (nearly 9 hours). I so didn’t expect to like it that much, but I did.
There is Lenah, who is an evil 500yrs old Vampire Queen. She’s among the strongest, most gifted and most powerful Vampire in the world and she created the post powerful coven in creating 4 unique Vampires that are bond to her for eternity. Yet, she craves to be human again. Dealing with all the pain she has to suffer as a Vampire makes her wish nothing more then to feel again. Rhode is her creator and also the love of her Vampire existence – they are bond to each other by love, since love is the only thing that keeps Vampires sane when existing for such a ling time.
The only possibility to become human again is by an ancient ritual where one Vampire needs to give up his own life in order to let the other Vampire life. Rhode loves Lenah so much, that he’s willing to do this for her. So Lenah hibernates for 100 years during which Rhode searches everything to complete the ritual for her.
Rhode enrolled Lenah at an expensive boarding school so that she can life a normal live, as an 16 year old Teenager and that she can try to grow up. We follow Lenah adjusting to the new century, since she missed the last 100 years and we see her making friends.
The story is driven by Lenah’s character and I loved being in her head. From time to time there are flashbacks to her former life, so that we get to know her better, how she was when she was a Vampire. And she was evil, truly evil. Yet, the casualty in which the story is told makes is intriguing to get to know Lenah better. How is she now as a human? Did she lost all evil, does she feel regret?
Although I’m normally not into flashback scenes, since they always keep the normal plot from moving forward, here I absolutely loved them! It showed the transformation Lenah made, and getting to know also her coven and Rhode better was captivating.
When Lenah befriends Tony, an art student and falls in love with Justin she starts feeling more human and open up to the world around her. I loved Tony her best friend so much! He was cute, sweet and a wonderful best friend for her. Justin is the typical rich, super gorgeous, sporty boy and first Lenah is just fascinated by his beautiful features but then she gets to know him better and falls in love.
I’m most and foremost in love with Lenah, she’s such a unique character – turning from Vampire to human that I really fell in love with her. Normally I always in love with the male lead, yet here it’s Lenah. Oh well and I don’t deny that I love Rhode so much that I’m still hoping he comes back – however that might be possible… (or not..)
Life for Lenah changes again when her coven discovers that she#s missing and they start searching for their queen…
The ending is shocking and my heart stopped a few times and I had to catch my breath. Tears were falling and I was so sad when I finally reached the end.
This book takes a unique take in the Vampire field. Vampire here are soulless creatures that are truly evil, yet there is the one that wants to become human again and the one that loves her so much that he sacrifies everything for her dream. The characters were wonderful and Lenah is a deep character you wish to explore more. I can’t wait for the next book and the moment it will be released I will have it in my hands!
The narration was flawless and I adored the British accent from Justin Eyre. She was most definitely the perfect match for this book and I enjoyed every minute I listened to her. Truth to be told this was one of the best audiobooks I listened, it was extremely captivating. Justin Eyre read tons of audiobooks and I will most definitely listen to her again, because she simply did an incredible job! Among others, she narrated Fallen and Torment and I although I read those books I tempt to to buy the audiobooks just because of her… Absolutely 5 stars for the audiobook..
And this my friends was one of my longest Reviews ever… I hope you stayed with me and didn’t run after the first half. I just love looooved loved this book so much, I had to share this!
This book is one of our audiobook reviews, so I’ll take this opportunity to remind you about our year-long challenge which started earlier this month:
If you haven’t signed up yet, you can do so here! All year long, we’ll be doing reviews of audiobooks we listen to and hosting monthly give-aways for anyone who joins the challenge and posts their audiobook reviews in our Mr. Linky post (you can find January’s post here). This month’s give-away is your choice of one of three audiobooks:
Now, have fun, have a wonderful weekend and.. let me hear your thoughts!!!
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Danny-
Great Review! Glad to hear you enjoyed it on audio. I read it and loved it. My only problem was that I thought Rhode sounded a little old for Lenah. And Lenah as a vampire was pure evil! But the story line was great and so were the characters. I can't wait for the next novel to come out!
Heather
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I loved Rhode so so much and it made me so sad, still I have a theorie which I will tell you in a mail and not here, since I don't want to too many spolier here.
You might be right about the age,but I think when you are 300 you don't care anymore about age which is why this never bothered me.
LOVED the narration with this wonderful british accent!
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Aww, *hands you a box of tissues* Great review Danny. I agree it was a tear jerker. Can't wait for Stolen Nights but I can't imagine how the story is going to continue …
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I loved this too! I'm actually writing a review for it as I type this. It was a fantastic book, I can't wait for the sequel.
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Oh wow. What an awesome review! I've seen this one around and I have it on my TBR, but honestly I wasn't all that into it. It sounded good, but that's it. Now after reading your review I can't wait to read this one! Great job!
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Glad you loved it as much as i did!
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Wow. Really? Maybe I should look into it 🙂
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