Twelfth Grade Kills

Well, I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Brewer is exceptionally predictable. Absolutely nothing came as a surprise in this for me (not even the "surprise" in the final chapter). It's still a good book, it just isn't "fine literature." ( )

I'm definitely not the target audience for this series, but I find it hard to believe it is so well liked by anyone. The idea has such great possibilities, but I felt Brewer spent too much time on mundane stuff and too little time on the parts that might have actually been interesting. Throughout the series, she'll present a conversation between Vlad and somebody that tells you very little (often is just repetitive of things we already know) and then she'll randomly skip four months and they will have an adventure that flies by too quickly that might have been quite interesting if she fleshed that part out.

Maybe her point was to dwell on the 'everyday' life of a teen half-vampire...but even for a series with titles by school year, the characters hardly spend any time in school in the last couple books. It's certainly not the focus so why lay them out that way? Marketing, I suppose.

Mostly, I was bored with the series and only finished all the books to see if she ever dealt with the one burning (pun totally intended) question I had that seemed it really should be answered. It was indeed mentioned in passing, with no answer - if Vlad is aging as a human through childhood, would he stop at some point or just continue to age? Is that the only way to kill him? He'll die of old age? That would be lame...at one point, Vlad wonders about his aging, but it is merely a paragraph and that's it.

There was possibility here for a really cool idea to be dealt with well. I don't think Brewer succeeded - the writing is OK, but not suspenseful and really, the whole series arc could have been told in two books or a trilogy, tops. It was dragged out and therefore too little was done in too many pages.

Sure, young male readers who don't want any kind of a challenge might like this series - although I would think many would be turned off by how much Vlad cries. ( )

This is the last book in the series, and there are suprizes that'll keep you wanitng more of these made. The ending is just as captive as the beginning. Q4P4 AHS/Jared H

Beth's review: In this the final book of the series all hell breaks looses as not only is Vlad trying to not be killed.
Along with Otis and the usual people and vampires now it is on the look for the father who died years ago who is the only one who can save Vlad's life or can he ........ everyone changes in this book and life is so much more complicated than ever before.

Teenage life is difficult enough without being a vampire. Love and hate are both powerful emotions, and they can make life even harder on an already complex teenage life. The issues with discovering your father who has been out of your life since you were four, reappearing, and finding out he was hiding, makes thigns even harder still, and really work on the love/hate lines. Still, with friends, caring, adn an epiphany from Snow, Vlad manages to pull it all together, and make his own future, not one others want to decide for him ( )

Review from goodreads.com:
It all comes down to this.

Vlad’s running out of time. The Elysian Council has given him weeks to live, and that’s if the Slayer Society doesn’t kill him – along with all the citizens of Bathory – first. Then there’s the issue of Vlad’s father, who may or may not still be alive after all these years, and oh yeah, that tiny little detail in the Pravus prophecy about Vlad enslaving Vampirekind and the human race. So much for college applications.

In this epic finale to Heather Brewer’s heart-stopping Chronicles of Vladimir Tod, dark secrets will be revealed, old friends will become enemies, and warm blood will run cold. Just be careful it isn’t yours.