15th Diamond: The Dark Heroine: Dinner with a Vampire Review

I had to be honest, I've never enjoyed reading a book involving vampire-romance.

The Mortal Instruments series is an exception, plus the romance is not into vampire ryte??

Sure there's a scene of Simon biting Isabelle, BUT THAT DOESN'T COUNT!

But this book, The Dark Heroine: Dinner with a Vampire is definitely an exception.

When I read Twilight, everything was lovey dovey, and you can pretty much guess the ending already.

  This book, however, is quite different. It takes vampiric bloodlust to a whole new level. The 

descriptions are vivid, despite the fact that the author was JUST 15 YEARS OLD when she wrote this...

Speaking of the author, she was an Oxford student, currently contracted by HarperCollins, if I'm not mistaken. She first wrote this book when she was 15 years old. Now she's already 18 years old. 

She wrote some other books too, it is all on her wattpad page. Her username is Canse 12. Now, she rose to fame when her book, The Dark Heroine reached millions of views on her wattpad, then her agent contacted her, and you know the rest :) I wish her success in her future

Now, back to the book review:

IT WAS AWESOME AND SUCH A THRILL!!!

The whole story is so vivid and easy to read! There are some scenes that can be considered as sadistic, which is one of the reasons why I don't really recommend this book to kids, but it adds a certain mood to the whole plot of the story. Imagine a vampire romance story without all the blood and fighting. (even the new Breaking Dawn movie is such a thrill because of its GREAT FIGHTING SCENE) Now when I mentioned blood, I meant real blood-spilling. Not the blood splatters during battles, but bloodlust. I never actually understood the word itself until I read this book. Kaspar (the male protagonist) literally drank a lot of blood from Violet (the female protagonist). Not to the verge of her death, but it's more like... teasing? Well anyways, those scenes are the ones that makes my heart race faster. Hahaha! IF I were to count the scenes that are quite different from other novels I've read, I'd say the scene where Violet almost got raped; secondly, when Vi here shags Kaspar; thirdly, the sadistic scene where Ilta (one of the bad guys) was bitten, torn apart, stomach cut apart, and blood sucked by his fellow vampires... I really couldn't imagine it =.= Or maybe I'm just an amateur in reading these kind of novels...

Back to the main plot of the story, it's all quite complicated and vast. There are dimensions, sages, dark creatures, mundanes, etc. There are also vampire royalties, ordinary vampires and half-vampires...

The story started with Violet waiting for her date in a park in London at night. Then, she witnessed 6 guys slaughtering 30 men inhumanly, but when she was about to run away, she got caught, by -- guess who? -- Kaspar. She didn't like him, obviously... He's a killer, or at least that's how she thought at first. Kaspar kidnapped her and took her to his palace/mansion where his ROYAL family live, along with his buddies and servants, of course. Kaspar told her, that since she knew about the existence of vampires, she has to choose to either spend the rest of her life in the mansion, or become a vampire. Eventually, Violet spends about 3 months in the mansion, waiting for a response from her father, who's the head of the security something there, and he turned out to have known of the vamprires too, not to mention some political problems between the royal vampires and the human goverment.  During those 3 months, a lot happened. There's this other guy named Fabian who was so nice to her and stuff; the younger sister of Kaspar, Thyme, who played with Violet; Kaspar's older sister, Lyla, who lended her clothes and stuff. Then it gets complicated when Fabian had a crush on Violet, while Lyla had a crush on Fabian, and you guess the rest...

Let's skip to the middle, shall we? One day, Violet found out about the Dark Heroine prophecy, which talks about 9 women/girls who will save the dimensions or something. Turns out, the 1st has been found. Guess who's the 2nd one? Tadaaa! It's our dear protagonist, Violet! Well, after this, everything's quite receded because she knew she is destined to be a heroine, and later she also finds out that she is tied to Kaspar spiritually and that they were meant to be together. Happy ending? Not yet. According to the prophecy, our dear Violet has to transform into a vampire. She was quite unsure of it, but since the prophecy said she has to, she did. After everyone knows she's a heroine, they regard her as "My lady" or "Lady Heroine" etc. Before, some who knew about her being tried to kill her, including Ilta, and his father -- sick family relations. Anyways, let's continue. The story ended with Violet being transformed by Kaspar into a vampire. But that's it. No story of what will happen after she's transformed. That means, we shall wait for the sequel! 

There goes my brief summary, which is not that nice compared to the real thing. The book has 60 chapters, I tell you. SIXTY (60)!!! But it's worth the time. Though I might not read it twice, cause it's not really a habit of mine to read like that... Oh, and I just remembered, the author is a VEGAN (vegetarian). And it's quite remarkable how she could imagine the bloody scenes and all... Maybe that's what caused her to become a vegan. Well, please support her by buying the real book, online or the physical copy. 

There are a few new things I learned from this book though, like STOCKHOLM SYNDROME. Stockholm syndrome is when a hostage grew sympathetic towards his/her kidnapper. Or some extreme cases, affection. (quote wikipedia) Pretty much what happened to Violet here since she was kidnapped, taken hostage, sucked of her blood, and yet she fell in love, even lust, for Kaspar. That's pretty much what makes it interesting. Teehee.

As a conclusion, I would like to give this book a 9/10 rating for it's thrilling scenes and great plot. I hope she'll continue creating awesome stories :D Oh, FYI, the second book is called The Dark Heroine: Autumn Rose. Curious of Autumn Rose? She appeared in the first book already, so go ahead and read it.
That's it from me :) Ciao~

Wattpad: The Dark Heroine

Thank you for reading

Sincerely yours, 

Alicia V

13th Diamond (continued): Mortal Instruments Teaser Trailer!

Now I have to tell you, the posters are great, the casts are great, the plot is great, AND THE MOVIE WILL BE GREAT!!!! The trailer is out and as I promised, I'll post it here :) enjoy dear shadowhunters~

I'll honestly say that I like Simon better than Jace here? or maybe not...All the casts are doing remarkable jobs in their roles and I really can't wait for August 2013! Let's wish for all the best!

I am though, quite worried...some extremists might made a controversy out of this. Why you ask? First of all, tattoos. Some religions doesn't agree with this, moreover their extremists...

Second, the symbol, rune actually, looks like a devil's horn? sort of...I don't get extremists sometimes. They critique Harry Potter, Twilight, yet all of that are not bad at all. I really hope this movie will be as successful as the book. and fyi, the effects on this poster is nice ryte?

Oh! And don't forget to read the book before watching the movie! It's worth your time trust me :)

Thank you for reading!

Sincerely yours, 

Alicia V

14th Diamond: One Direction's "Take Me Home"

Eventually, there's that time of the year when all the great artists and musicians release their

new albums...so far, there's One Direction, Taylor Swift, Ne-Yo, and Pitbull is coming up, as well as Rihanna and a lot more....

BUT TODAY, 

I'll do a review track-by-track of One Direction's new album, TAKE ME HOME!!!

On the side note, their last album made it to #1 on Billboard am I right? This year, I'm pretty sure they'll achieve the same thing :D Well, SUPPORT THEM BY BUYING THE ALBUM! not downloading them...

Without further ado, here goes the amateur review of a 17 year old (new) directioner.

1. Live While We're Young

This one has been around for a while, a month? It has reach the top 10 youtube charts, iTunes chart, you name it. The music video is out, and still running the charts of youtube. It's the first single of the album.

Catchiest line: "Let's get CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY 'TIL WE SEE THE SUN"

2. Kiss you

This one is going to be the third single from their album and it's basically, a bit mature for 3 year olds :) but I doubt parents will realize really...it's basically about a guy wanting to kiss a girl, and the rest are...mwah! There's a lot of na na na na na too!

Catchiest line: "Makin' them drool out of their chinny chin chins." 

3. Little Things

What could be better than an appreciative song of a boy towards his girlfriend? Saying how much he loves her, accompanied by the acoustic guitar playing in the background, I can see it already! It's their second single from the album, and I tell you, I TELL YOU, THEY SING THIS SONG TO YOUUUUUU!

Catchiest line: "You've never loved yourself as much as I love you."

4. C'mon C'mon

Definitely one of my favorite tracks from this album :D Tells the story of a guy who was left by his girlfriend or some girl in a party/club then he saw another girl who happen to be very attractive~ Then the song continues just like that

"So c'mon c'mon and dance with me baby"

5. Last First Kiss

Now this song tells of a boy who wants to be the first kiss, and also the last. It can also refer to "first time" which I'm sure Directioners all over the world wouldn't mind at all if done toward One Direction :P The guitars are a perfect addition towards this song.

"And if you~ only knew~ I wanna be last yea, baby let me be your last first kiss"

6. Heart Attack

Now this song is about jealousy am I right? Or getting over some girl I guess. Overall, it has a catchy tune and also the falsetoes(did I spell this right?) just made it better. The occasional "oow!" is funny though lol

"You're giving me a heart attack, getting over you u u u u~"

7. Rock Me

I can't say I like the idea of One Direction wanting to rock...but they made it! It has the same opening as "We Will We Will Rock You" song. The electric guitar reffs also add to the rock feeling, but I honestly don't really get the point of the song -.-" sorry, regret maybe? And pedal is referring to guitar pedals right???

"Hit the pedal, heavy metal, show me you care"

8. Change My Mind

It's quite a slow paced song that adds balance to the whole album. Since so far most of the songs are so upbeat; however, this song seems sad. Imagine them singing this in the rain, every girl would swoon~

"Don't go o o o o~"

9. I Would

This song tells of a girl who already have a boyfriend who had 27 tattoos and of course, he wants the girl and compares himself to the boyfriend :D I don't really find it catchy though, somehow, maybe because it sounds similar to One Thing? nooooo! The whistles are a nice addition though, teehee

"Baby you should know, I would"

10. Over Again

I swear the first time I heard this song, I knew Ed Sheeran contributed to it! A lot! It's so rhyming and acoustic. The song itself is so sad and I feel sad for them...the percussion came at the right time though, which made the song quite enjoyable

"And I will give you all my heart so we can start it all over again"

11. Back for You

It's awesome! 'nuf said

"I'll be comin' back for you, back for you, back for you"

12. They Don't Know About Us

Now this one, is so touchy. I'll say a lot of young people nowadays feel the same way. This song sounds classy though, with the beats and all. 

"They don't know about the things we do. They don't know about the 'I love you'."

13. Summer Love

This song is perfect. The guitar is perfect, the harmony is perfect, and the lyrics will make us reply "I will never leave you! I promise!!" It's as if they're really singing how they don't want summer to end because of this one girl...

"You were myyyyyyyyyyyy summer love"

14. She's Not Afraid

This one is only available in the Yearbook version, or downloadable from the internet :P It's a catchy song with catchy beats, telling of a girl who is afraid of falling in love despite all the kissing and dates 

"She's not afraid of scary movies. She likes the way we kiss in the dark, but she's so afraid of fa'fa'fallin in looooovveeee~"

15. Loved You First

Now this track is totally one of my faves~ Harry's solo <3 It's about a boy who has been waiting for a chance to ask this girl out, but another boy did it before him...I pity you man. The bridge is so nice~ it sounds classy yeeaayy

"Girl I get so close, but now you'll never know, baby I loved you first"

16. Nobody Compares

I can't stop putting this on repeat cause the chorus is just so catchy! woop! But the story is about a boy who just broke up with his girlfriend..meh

"We're so Paris, when we kiss~" *swoon*

17. Still the One

I loooooveee the beat in this song. It makes everything so cheery and fun :D I don't get the "aiaiai" part...it's "I" but sung "I~~~~~~" catchy, but meh

"Hey you! You're still the one!"

These several tracks are only exclusively on the "Take Me Home Deluxe TARGET Edition"

14. Truly, Madly, Deeply

Now why are all the bonus tracks so nice to listen to?!! This acoustic song expresses a boy's head-over-heals love over a girl. It's a sweet song but, after a few times of listening to it, I still prefer the other one, "Irresistible" which is coming in a while :)

"Truly, madly, deeply I am foolishly, completely fallin"

15. Magic

Is it just me or this sounds similar to "What Makes You Beautiful"?? It's still one of the catchiest song in the album though, yeaaaaaa~ the "tadadada" part is so cute :3

"Cuz everything you do is magic~"

16. Irresistible

IRRESISTIBLE is what this song is! It's, again, about a broke up i think...but this acoustic song can make the mood melancholic but sweet at the same time. I don't know how they do that really. Maybe because they have such angelic voices~ swoooon

"You lips so kissable, and your kiss unmissable. Your fingertips so touchable, and your eyes irresistible"

Yes2, you guys have irresistible eyes~ #fangirlmodeon!!

There goes the amateur review from me :) I hope you guys will support One Direction by buying their album onilne, at HMV, or on iTunes. Thank you for reading!

p.s: My copy of this album is coming! *so excited*

Sincerely yours, 

Alicia V