REVIEW: Last Sacrifice (Vampire Academy #6) by Richelle Mead (@RichelleMead)

Murder. Love. Jealousy. And the ultimate sacrifice.

The Queen is dead and the Moroi world will never be the same. Now, with Rose awaiting wrongful execution and Lissa in a deadly struggle for the royal throne, the girls find themselves forced to rely upon enemies and to question those they thought they could trust. . . .

But what if true freedom means sacrificing the most important thing of all?

Each other.

 

This is a bittersweet moment right now.  The end of a series.  I always have that sense of loss……or……withdrawals.  Whatever you want to call it.  I reach the end of a series and think now what?  Luckily, I own a book review site and am never at a loss for reading material.  *snicker snicker*

Well, the end of theVampireAcademyseries was no different.  I was excited to hit the end of the series and find out what became of everyone but at the same time, I wanted to drag it out……which is why it took me 5 days to listen to this one audiobook. 

Anyway…..Let’s get to the book, shall we?

This entire series has been set up as a long story arc that was separated into almost stand-alone novels.  Not quite stand-alone but almost.  The last two books really were not set up that way.  Blood Promise and Last Sacrifice were most definitely one big book chopped into two.  Blood Promise left off with Rose getting thrown in the slammer for the murder of Queen Tatiana Ivashkov, monarch over the Moroi.  Last Sacrifice takes us through the who-done-it to solve the mystery of the Queen’s murder and clear Rose’s name.  A few startling discoveries sprinkled along the way make for an interesting ride.

I loved most of this book.  Let’s start with the big one – The Dimitri-Rose-Adrian love triangle.  The D-R-A Triangle is infuriating in this installment.  Absolutely infuriating.  We have hit a point where we know that Rose belongs with Dimitri.  However, she’s actually developed a pretty good relationship withAdrian and, for me anyway,Adrian has become one of my favorite characters.  The D-R-A Triangle is infuriating because with the connection between D and R, we are not supposed to want R and A to be good together…..but they are.  So, as a reader, who do you pull for at that point?  This was the conundrum I found myself in for the majority of this book.  I was having a hard time deciding whether I wanted Rose to stop dicking around and make a real commitment toAdrian or if I wanted Dimitri to stop dicking around and pull himself together.  For someone that listened to the audiobook, it was like a 4 hour anxiety attack for a little bit there. 

With all of that being said, I was very happy with the choice that was finally made in the end.  However….

I felt that the ending to the love story in this series was very anti climactic.  Not that I want to see Rose and her beau boning in the middle of the Moroi Court or anything but give us something that shows us that our main character is in love…..  Really in love.  Instead, we get what might as well have been “Hey.”  “Hey.”  “How are you?”  “Good.”  “Good.”  Booooooooooooorrrrrrring!!!!!  Ugh….

Anyway, aside from that horrible piece, the rest of the book was fantastic.  We had a wonderfully written mystery to play with.  Several of them actually.  The biggest of the mysteries being who murdered the Queen.  Trust me when I say that you will be SHOCKED when the big reveal happens.  I never so this coming.  Not even one little itty bitty bit.  I thought sure I had it pegged about 75% of the way through and I was WAY wrong.  That’s a well written mystery.

The more exposure we get to him, the more I love Abe.  He’s absolutely hilarious.  The man genuinely has next to no morals and he’s damn funny about it.  I was listening to this audiobook while working my day job and busted out laughing when I heard this (with Rose narrating):

He smiled at me fondly.

“Ah, my daughter,” he said.  “Eighteen and you’ve been accused of murder, aided felons and acquired a death count higher than most guardians will ever see.”  He paused.  “I couldn’t be prouder!”

I laughed so damned hard at that.  *smiles*  Every time he’s in the book, he says something that just makes you shake your head with borderline disbelief. 

Each one of the characters in this book goes through a serious change and some are quite good.  Lissa is amazing in this book.  She’s a very admirable character! 

Overall, I am giving Last Sacrifice 4.5 stars.  It would have been 5 stars if not for the dud of an ending.  Everything up until the last 5 minutes of the book was so fast paced and adrenaline filled and suspenseful and tense and then……….kaput.  So 4.5 stars.  A really, really good book.  The ending just felt like the author was simply out of ideas. 

I am also not 100% yet on whether or not I am going to go to Bloodlines.  I will keep you posted.

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