Review: The Immortal Rules by Julie Kagawa

  Title: The Immortal Rules
  Author: Julie Kagawa
  Publisher: Harlequin UK
  Publication Date: April 24th 2012
  Source: NetGalley
  My rating: 4 stars
  
  Reviewed by: Jasprit

 




     
“Immortality is a lonely road”

I’ve been in a bit of vampire funk lately, I haven’t really been enjoying my paranormal reads as much as I used to, with my last vampire read being a book in the Sookie Stackhouse series which has been going, abysmally downhill as of late. You can imagine I went into the Immortal Rules with a bit of trepidation. But I need not have worried because I soon realised that it was a refreshing change, to my usual reads.

Allie is brought up in a world where everyone is aware of vampires. The vampires have control over everything, if they’re not around then they have their pets deal with the problems. In a vampire controlled society; there are two options; you’re either a registered or an unregistered. Being a registered, the vampires know about you and you have to donate your blood, in return for this you will get food privileges. Being an unregistered you’re typically under the radar, vampires don’t have the knowledge of who you are, where you live and you don’t have to donate blood, but you don’t get any food. You’re basically left to scavenge around for any scraps you can find without getting caught. If caught you then face the consequences of being hanged. Allie has to deal with the relentless life of being an unregistered. Hiding away and risking her life day in day out to find what she can. However everything changes one unfortunate night, she’s located a basement with a vast amount of food which can feed her group for a long time. As a group they decide to venture out and try and bring it back. But they’re attacked by rabids on the way back, her friends are gone and Allie’s left to her death. But then a vampire appears giving her a choice; choose immortality and become a vampire; something she’s hated with a passion or choose to die. Allie feels the life hasn’t gone out of her yet, she’s still got so much to live for, so she chooses to become a vampire.

The world that Kagawa created was immense; I’ve read vampire books before, but with this one it was different, it was better. There was always the fear of the unknown; not knowing when a rabid or a vampire could be around the corner and constantly risking your life to survive any way you can.

I loved Allie’s relationship with her sire Kanin, the banter between them and his exasperated looks. However I felt that her time with Kanin was quickly cut short. I would have loved to have gotten to know Kanin’s character more. For the time he was around he was illusive and secretive, I felt that we only scratched the surface with his character. I’m hoping that we’ll have the chance to delve deeper with his character in the rest of the series.

It was also a refreshing change to actually read a book from vampire’s perspective or a human turned vampire. I felt that all I’ve read in the past is the human falling in love with the vampire and the vampire not being able to be with them. But this was different; it was good getting into Allie’s head, getting an understanding of just how hard it was to control her hunger. We were given a great insight into this when she decided to tag along with a group of humans under the pretence that she was a human herself. There was some seriously heart pounding moments which I thoroughly enjoyed and it was exhilarating watching Allie hiding her vampire side from the humans, her super strength and speed, not being able to go out in daylight and not being able to eat. Just as Allie started to form a close bond with several people, so did I. I didn’t want her to be separated from them, even though I knew it was impossible for her to remain with them forever.

It was heart wrenching at times watching Allie battle her internal struggles; she didn’t want to be a monster, she didn’t want to feed off people, but without feeding there was no way she could survive.

The Immortal Rules was a book which brings traditional vampires back with a bang, it was full with tantalising tense moments, unexpected surprises, it’s fast paced, action packed and just leaves you wanting more. I’m extremely looking forward to getting stuck into the rest of the series.

A big thank you to Harlequin UK for the opportunity to read this book.