The Vampire Academy books, written by Richelle Mead are by far one of my favorite series of all time. I started reading them in my freshmen year of high school and finished the series in my sophomore year. Every time she released a new book I went out and bought it immediately, and I didn’t put any of them down until I was done reading them. Richelle Mead did a fantastic job with the character development, creating the perfect settings, and plot lines.

To give you all an idea of what the books are about, there is a school in Montana called St. Vladimir’s Academy. The main purpose of this academy is to teach Dhampirs how to protect the Moroi and to teach all of their students about the normal academics along with other topics. Dhampirs are the children of a vampire and a human, they are very strong and quick and usually turn into great guardians for their assigned Moroi. Moroi are the children of two vampires, possess the ability to control one of the five elements (fire, water, earth, air, and spirit), and don’t feel comfortable in the sunlight. The Dhampirs are guardians for the Moroi that are royalty.

The main protagonists of the novels are Rosemarie (Rose) Hathaway and Vasilisa (Lissa) Dragomir. In the first book these best friends have been on the run for two years now. They wanted to get away from St. Vladimir’s Academy, but eventually Guardian Dimitri Belikov retrieved the two of them. When they arrive to the school he also offers to be Rose’s mentor in order to catch her up with the rest of the students, thereby allowing her chances of being Lissa’s guardian to grow much higher.  Later on Lissa starts getting death threats and is exposed to other horrible events from an unknown identity. Things just get crazier and crazier the more they spend time there.

This series has everything that anyone could ask for. Whether it be bloodshed, drama, romance, or plot twists at every corner. Richelle Mead provides all of these things in the Vampire Academy series. If anyone had any thoughts of possibly giving these novels a try I would highly recommend it. The author even has a few spin-off books published already, so there is a lot of material to be read! So give the books a shot, start reading!