Release Date: January 31st 2016
Rate: 3.5 stars (Enjoyed it)
Rate: 3.5 stars (Enjoyed it)
Synopsis:
My name is Bianka, and I live in a world a lot like yours. Or at least, I used to.
Then I got harvested.
Taken into eerie darkness underneath the surface of my world, I’ve learned that cities like mine – Hidden Oaks – are just places that the vampires keep humans until it’s time to drink their blood. Now it’s my turn. They’re harvesting me.
But I’m fighting hard, and the vampires have noticed. A sponsor is buying me. A handsome, mysterious vampire with piercing eyes, who wants me to fight other humans in The Vampire Games. If I lose, I’ll be harvested. If I win, I’ll join my sponsor, Phillip, as one of them.
I’ll be turned into a vampire.
All I must do to spend an eternity with Phillip is sell my soul.
The scary part? I’d do a lot worse for him than that.
I have had The Vampire Games in my TBR for a while now. Everything that resembles the hunger games even if you add the paranormal aspect to the story makes me a bit skeptical because this could end up as a major fangirling moment for me or end up hating the story. Hence why it took me so long to finally start this book.
To sum up the story a bit, the main character, Bianka, has no clue what's happening in her city. Humans are harvested for the vampires who apparently rule the world without the humans even knowing. Even though she ended up in a "nice cage" she tried to run. But instead of getting away from that awful place she goes and tries to help her friend, Mark. This leads her to enter the vampire games after she has been bought by her first vampire savior, Phillip. The prize of winning the vampire games? Becoming a vampire. But Bianka has another thing in mind if she wins the games. And so their story begins.
From the beginning Bianka was presented as a strong female character that knows how to adapt to every single situation and most important how to survive. She's also kind and good since she ends up going back to save her friend instead of running when she had the chance. Phillip on the other hand, was shown as an antagonistic savior. He tried to do the right thing among her kingdom and when saving Bianka. However, he assumed that everyone wanted to be a vampire and that's where he was wrong.
The romance between these two very different characters is a progressive one as well as awkward. The characters are drawn to each other but the situation of Bianka fighting for her life and Phillip being a vampire come between them more than once. I liked that Bianka wasn't too eager to jump into a relationship or something like that just because they were supposed to be together.
The world was well-built and the writing helps the reader to create a clear vision of what Stephanie Archer's world would look like. However, was nothing that we haven't read before due to the big games, trying to win to save their lives, etc.
For my liking, when I ended the book, it gave me the impression that the book was too short and that mostly everything in the story was hanging in the other. Nothing was solved. Only Phillip and Bianka's relationship and that the world was not what Bianka thought it was which was solved in the first chapters. I would say that the impression the story gives to the reader is a bit weak.
Despite this not so original dystopian topic, the whole story is a good one that I truly enjoyed and easily devoured in less than an hour and a half. So I highly recommend it to all those YA paranormal romantics out there. Give it a try. I will definitely be waiting for the next book and see what's going to happen between the two main characters.
