Review Detail

This is the first sentence of The Immortal Rules:

“They hung the Unregistereds in the old warehouse district […]”

From where I sit, there is no excuse for a traditionally published, copy-edited book to contain a mistake like that. Much less in the first sentence.

Needless to say, I didn’t start off this book with the best of first impressions.

Thank goodness the rest of this book was absolutely fantastic! Mostly, anyways.

Initially, the reader meets Allison, a tough girl with an additude who lives on the streets. She spends her days scrounging for food and her nights hiding from vampires and zombie-vampires. She’s independent, stubborn, defiant, strong, and really likeable. Score for Ms Kagawa.

The city Allison lives in, New Covington, is a sort of dystopian haven run by a vampire prince and his minions. Said city has an interesting set-up, a believable infrastructure, and even better, what goes on outside the city is also detailed. Excellent world-building, freakin’ awesome premise. Score for Ms Kagawa.

Then Allison gets Turned by the dark and menacing but secretly compassionate rogue vampire, Kanin. Kanin is enigmatic and mysterious, not very forthcoming with his past actions, but very determined that Allison should learn to survive on her own and become reconciled to her fate. Well. Tall dark and handsome vampire with a tortured hero complex? SCORE for Ms Kagawa.

However, Allison and Kanin get separated. Allison finds herself with a group of religious fantatic humans on a quest for a sort of holy grail. She joins their little group and meets up with Zeke (named after the “archangel Ezekiel.” But don’t look for him in your Bible because there’s no such person in the Judeo-Christian canon—fail for Kagawa.) Zeke is, true to his name, angelic. Almost too perfect at times. Personally, I preferred Kanin. Not score.

Then some truly crazy stuff happens. Vampire gladitorial contests, crazy zombies, child abuse in a graveyard, hijacking of motorcycles, a stereotypical jealous girlfriend. All very interesting stuff that eventually leads up to a very satisfying amount of Kanin-related nightmares on Allison’s part and my hope that in the sequel, The Eternity Cure, Kanin the awesome vampire plays a very large role.

(I am a huge fan of Kanin, in case you couldn’t tell, and not necessarily as a love interest for Alisson. Just because he’s a fantastic character.)

Anyway. That was a really weirdly written review.

I’ve never read urban fantasy before, and I’ve never met a main character like Allison before. I’ve also never heard of dystopian vampires before, which is sad because they’re pretty sweet. All these super awesome things go together so well. Julie Kagawa is a master of writing here. If you like edgy heroines, unique plots, or maybe a more “mature” look at YA fiction, read The Immortal Rules. It’s awesome.