Read Online Almost To Die For (Vampire Princess Of St. Paul, #1) Illustrated By Tate Hallaway Formatted As Audio Books
not done with reading the book, working on that,
But so far, it's hanging on a thin thread,
I don't have a thing against Ana, but she seems annoying to me,
Since I've been reading adult books, getting back into these made me see how immature the POV and writing can be and it makes me kinda cringe.
I was about to give up on the book but then her handsome father showed up, so I stuck with it,
The part I'm at is adding more meat to the story, but I don't like how they are handling things, like I said, it's immature, . I don't like Nik, he seems so random in his attitude, I definitely do not LIKE the mother, . she's so childish!
We'll see how I feel about it once I finish,
Edit
So I finally finished the book and it was as I would imagined,
The storyline and characters are so cheesy! Ana's mom needs to be check for multiple personalities, .
Wish there was more growth instead of them becoming someone else entirely, . For starters i need some time to laugh at the first sentence of the summary, "Princess Diaries" . yeah like no way. It has the idea of "simple girl turn to princess" but that's all, Not the magic of Princess Diaries, It was more interesting than Twilight though,
While the book starts pretty much good and okay, with the time it becoming confusing and with no real purpose, It has vampires to be all strong and mighty, but one human with no real talent sneak up on them more than once, The writer can't seem to decide what she wants for her character, She is in and out in her old and new life all the time, And i can accept that but not that fast, It was going so fast, that you didn't even have time to release how the new environment was,
The story really had potential, It was clever and i liked the idea, but it was not written nicely, It made me bored from the very first pages, and it make predictable when it could have some really good twists, And as at the start i liked the main character, at the end i came to hate her since she was once again one of the those characters who just like to play with boys but at the same time are playing it naive and all.
Can't say i enjoy it, It was just a read, and in some years i will probably don't even remember that i've read that book,
Almost to Die For by Tate Hallaway
First in the Vampire Princess of St, Paul series
stars
On Anastasija Parkers sixteenth birthday, she knows that itll be a day to remember and not for the best.
Ana is a witch, but shes never got a knack for a witch powers and is sure shell fail the Initiation ceremony, If her day couldnt get any worse, a father she thought was deadbeat, turns out to be undead, but not just any undead, Hes a vampire king, which makes Ana a princess and totally confused about everything, As she struggles to decide which side she wants to fulfill two boys seem to vying for her heart, Theres Nikolai, a hot witch, rocker, and vampire hunter, and Elias, a vampire Commander, The Goodreads summary says Twilight meets the Princess Diaries, I can see that with the whole princess aspect of everything else in this book doesnt resemble Twilight, not even the love triangle, Im tired of these summarizing people coming up with these lame and false comparisons, Ill step down from my soap box before I get to worked up and just start my review, I wasnt sure what I was expecting when I picked up Almost Die to For, One thing I was certain about was that it was a short book and hopefully it wouldnt take me long to read, My library put this book and its sequel in the adult romance section and I was just kind of like “What” I had already known this was YA and didnt see how it would be considered adult and I still dont.
There was no drinking, sex, suggestive language, cursing, and well usual “inappropriate” things, The writing was captivating for such a short read and I found Hallaways writing style easy to breeze through, I didnt want to put the book down at times because the pacing was just so well done and the plot flowed,
Whimsical Writing Scale:,
The main female character is Ana, I was reading Jessicas Guide to Dating on the Dark Side at the same time and I thought it was weird how their names were both Anastasia just different spellings.
Hehe On to my thoughts, Ana is pretty relatable for a teenager, Aside from the fact that shes a witch and a vampire I connected with her, I like when its to connect with the main character it makes the book much more enjoyable, Maybe thats why I liked this book more than others, One thing that bothers me is the ending and how it worries about Anas future choices, I of course have no idea where these choices will lead but I have a feeling it wont end drama free, Ana could hold her own ground,
KickButt Heroine Scale:,
The main male characters are Nikolai and Elias, I had liked Nikolai a lot at first but then they had this one part and it made me as uneasy as Ana, Ana tried to run away but she ended up getting sucked back in by him, He sounds hot, but I just dont trust him, I also feel like we didnt get enough character depth when it came to him, Hopefully in Almost Final Curtain, Ill see more, Elias was I guess supposed to be the bad boy, But these boys both seem like bad boys to me, Both of these boys need more development in the next installment and I expect that.
Until I get more development these boys are at a tie because I dont know them well enough to fully judge them and compare which is best for Ana.
Swoon Worthy Scale: Nikolai:Elias:
The Villain Anas mom I think shes supposed to be the villain, I mean she was a bump in the road and poses to be a problem, but she didnt make me tremble in my socks as much as Im sure the author intended.
That whole spider web scene was pretty awesome though,
Villain Scale:,
Ramses, Anas dad, seems like hell be there more for Ana in the future than her mom, This is my prediction. Bea and Taylor are Anas friends, Bea is annoying and seems fake, She turns to easily on people and thats unsettling, Taylor is as flat as cardboard,
sitelink
I think I just learned more about the cardboard than I did when reading descriptions of Taylor, She has promise though.
Character Scale:,
This books biggest weakness is character depth, but since its a short book and I really enjoyed it Im not going to rant about it like I normally would.
This is supposed to be a fun book and I had fun reading it, I try not to take short books seriously because then it just wouldnt be as fun, Plus Ive been in a pretty good mood this week so maybe thats why I enjoyed it so much, This book has pretty much everything from vampires to witches to hunters to demons, Im looking forward to the sequel and I expect more and hopefully more character depth, Fingers crossed
Plotastic Scale:,
Cover Thoughts: I love the cover, It looks exactly like how I pictured Ana to look and its simple, Theres no overused flowing Prom Dress, but just a simple girl looking like a vampire, Its perfect!
Let me give a brief review since it seems many haven't gotten around to this one yet, The main character in the story is Anastasija Parker and she is about to turn, she's also a witch, Not a Wiccan practitioner, but an actual witch who belongs to a coven, With her upcoming birthday she needs to pass a test in order to remain in her coven or forever be exiled, As she gets ready for her test, a man shows up on her doorstop claiming to be her father, . and he isn't a witch, As Anastasija fights to find her rightful place in the world, she is busy fighting off the different supernatural sides, Will she fail, or become something more than anyone thought she could
Some of the things that bothered me about this book were some of the things that also designate it a YA book.
There was a little too much teen angst for me, and an annoyingly large amount of boy/girl "issues",
What I did like, the world building, Some supernatural characters were portrayed a little differently than in other books and also Anastasija herself, She ended up being unique, and I'm interested to see where the author takes the story, Ana Parker has a memorable sixteenth birthday and not in a good way, She is worried about the ceremony that is supposed to confirm her as a True Witch but it requires magic and, despite what her mother tells her, she can't do magic.
She learns that her father is a vampire king that her mother has never mentioned and won't answer questions about, Both of her parents want her to choose their side in the war that was supposed to be ended when her parents married and had a child,
Ana doesn't know what to do, She meets Elias who is a member of the vampire king's guard who swears to protect her and who gives her some information about the witchvampire fight, She also gets closer to Nikolai who is a member of the coven and who she has known for a while, She is interested in him but felt he was out of her league and, besides, her best friend also had a crush on him, Nikolai has been training all his life to become a vampire slayer which is sort of a problem because Ana is halfvampire,
I enjoyed the St, Paul setting and seeing some familiar locations included in this story, This was an entertaining urban fantasy story, I liked Ana and sympathized with the tough decisions she had to make about her future, Personally, I'm on the side of the vampires since all of the violence and coercion came from Ana's mother who, it turns out, is queen of the witches.
This is the first book in a trilogy, I can't wait to read the rest, Almost to Die For is the story of Ana, a young witch who learns that she is half vampire, Stuck between two warring worlds, Ana tries to figure out who she is vampie or witch and what side she will stand with, Ana could be a lovable character with her inner dialogue of quirk and real sentiment, for example, when she explains the fact that her class schedule goes from physics to gym as bad karma, However, Ana is a wishy washy character, Put her in a room with someone and she will not only sympathize with them, but she
will suddenly agree with them on every point psycho mom casts a nasty spell on her turning her into a zombie.
. . shrug Oh she gets why her mom would do something so terrible, . . HUH! I sure don't get it! She tells us that she is shy and is often viewed by the other characters as thoughtful and smart when in fact, she's incredibly sarcastic, not afraid to say what she thinks, and doesn't appear to be all that thoughtful.
It seems to me the author never really had a handle on who Ana was as a character and it is due to this that the story, told from her point of view, suffers greatly.
I enjoyed the parts where Ana was alone or dating, but the episodes with her mother were not as good, Her mother is a world class, . . not a nice person AT ALL, Then her father just shows up after a life time of never knowing him and she immediately starts calling him Dad Yeah, Sure. Not to mention, leather pants and a peasant shirt It is possible to be any more cliche And don't even get me started on her and Bea, . . her absolute best friend in the whole world whom she keeps reminding us that she doesn't really like all that much,
Her mother had some big secret that she wouldnt share, Some big secret that could save Anas life, and I found it really hard to believe that a normal parent would do this, Occasionally, the her mothers spoken dialogue sounded forced as well, Her mothers spells were awkward and the fact that all the spells had to rhyme, . . they reminded me more of a mystical Dr, Seuss than a scary incantation,
The only character I could connect with and I had a very strong connection with him was Elisa, His story and character were completely compelling, I would LOVE to know more about him,
What I enjoyed about this novel was the premise, The vampires in this novel aren't your run of the mill vampires, I really liked that they were more tribal and spiritual which was a nice twist on the norm, Their mythology was extremely interesting, And the link between the witches and the vampires was also creative, Truly, it was the one thing that saved me from absolutely disliking this novel was the uniqueness of the world Hallaway created,
That said, the ending was completely forced, everything falling into place oh so neatly for Ana, Leave one man behind, after she conveniently saves the day, and rush off to see the other, Honestly, when I closed the book I just thought she was the world's flakiest person, I highly doubt I will read the sequel to this novel even though I am curious to get to know Elias more, I think it will only serve to frustrate me since I really can't bring myself to like/sympathize with Ana more,
Overall I think that Tate Hallaway did a good job of creating an interesting world for this story to take place in, I just wish she spent more time on character development,
As a final note: I really hate writing negative reviews like this, It makes me extremely grumpy, .