Review- The Immortal Rules

Title: The Immortal Rules
Author: Julie Kagawa
Series: Blood of Eden #1
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Find it here: Amazon, Goodreads
Source: ARC provided by NetGalley and Harlequin

In a future world, Vampires reign. Humans are blood cattle. And one girl will search for the key to save humanity.

Allison Sekemoto survives in the Fringe, the outermost circle of a vampire city. By day, she and her crew scavenge for food. By night, any one of them could be eaten.

Some days, all that drives Allie is her hatred of them. The vampires who keep humans as blood cattle. Until the night Allie herself is attacked—and given the ultimate choice. Die… or become one of the monsters.

Faced with her own mortality, Allie becomes what she despises most. To survive, she must learn the rules of being immortal, including the most important: go long enough without human blood, and you will go mad.

Then Allie is forced to flee into the unknown, outside her city walls. There she joins a ragged band of humans who are seeking a legend—a possible cure to the disease that killed off most of humankind and created the rabids, the mindless creatures who threaten humans and vampires alike.

But it isn’t easy to pass for human. Especially not around Zeke, who might see past the monster inside her. And Allie soon must decide what—and who—is worth dying for.

My thoughts: 

This is a very difficult review for me to write. So many people are big fans of Julie Kagawa, her Iron Fey series and of The Immortal Rules. I’ve read the first two books in the Iron Fey series and even though I thought they were pretty good and enjoyable, I felt like they were unnecessarily long. And I have the same feelings toward The Immortal Rules. I enjoyed it enough, but I felt it was unnecessarily long.

When I heard Julie Kagawa was writing a vampire series, I inwardly groaned because I have grown somewhat weary of vampire books. There are only so many ways you can write a vampire story and after a while they all start sounding the same. But somehow Kagawa was able to make it different. I really enjoyed the dystopian aspect of the book and the world building. Allison is human in the beginning and she talks of humans being taken over, books being outlawed and not a lot of use for the modern technology that we have now. What really made her vampire story different was the hierarchy of the vampire race and the mass population of rabid vampires. When a master vampire creates anther vampire, the bloodline become diluted. So when that new vampire tries to create a new vampire it becomes even more diluted and it doesn’t take as easily. Thus ending up with rabids who have no inclination of common sense or self control.

But there the story becomes the same is the vampire who is struggling to hold on to her humanity. This is a very common story line in vampire books which is understandable because the vampire was once human and they don’t want to be some kind of killing machine. They don’t want to become what they once hated.

Allison is an enjoyable main character. She’s a strong, kick ass, Asian girl who wields a samurai sword! That’s pretty awesome! She has a fierce survival instinct but can also be compassionate. She took a weaker kid under her wing; she protected him from the bullies and fed him when she was struggling to feed herself. I really felt for her most of the time. She’s had it rough. As for the romance, I think it's doomed from the start! She meets Zeke on the road to Eden where vampires are not allowed in, but they still managed to fall for each other. I don't see how this romance could possible continue in the future! But it definitley has me looking forward to see how it's going to play out!

Even though I enjoyed The Immortal Rules, I have a feeling it was all build up to the next one. It makes me really excited to thinks that the second book is going to be completely awesome! I give this book 3.5 hearts for an action-packed adventure and incredible world building!