Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side

Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side by Beth Fantaskey

Publisher: Harcourt
Pages: 351
Release date: February 1st 2009
Source: Library
Summary (from Goodreads):  The undead can really screw up your senior year ...

Marrying a vampire definitely doesn’t fit into Jessica Packwood’s senior year “get-a-life” plan. But then a bizarre (and incredibly hot) new exchange student named Lucius Vladescu shows up, claiming that Jessica is a Romanian vampire princess by birth—and he’s her long-lost fiancé. Armed with newfound confidence and a copy of Growing Up Undead: A Teen Vampire’s Guide to Dating, Health, and Emotions, Jessica makes a dramatic transition from average American teenager to glam European vampire princess. But when a devious cheerleader sets her sights on Lucius, Jess finds herself fighting to win back her wayward prince, stop a global vampire war—and save Lucius’s soul from eternal destruction.

My review:

Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side was quite different from what I was expecting, in a good way.  I was a little bit doubtful from just hearing the name, but the summary sounded fresh, new, and excited.  And am I ever happy that I did pick it up!

The storyline was one of the best I've ever read!  It kept me interested throughout the whole book, though for the first few page I was thinking: haven't I read this before?  Another vampire book where the vamp is always watching the girl?  Perhaps I have read that a lot before, but I began to see that Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side wasn't just like that.  I thought that the most interesting part was that when Jessica actually began to start liking Lucius, he decided that she wasn't good enough for him, and started to flirt with a girl that Jessica hated.  I loved seeing how annoyed Jessica became because of that!


Thank you Lucius, for telling Jessica what you are right in the beginning.  And thank you, Jessica, for not accepting it.  In so many books, the boy finally tells her what he is after lots and lots and lots of suspense (even though it's obvious what he is), and she just accepts it.  Honestly?  Say you were the girl and found out that your boyfriend was a vampire; what would you do?  Just say 'Okay' and go on with life?  I loved how it wasn't just like that in Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side.


The characters were exciting and refreshing!  They were so different from a typical character in a book.  There was a hint of humor in each of them, but they were serious at some points, too.  I loved all of them for different reasons, and I have to say that Jessica is now one of my favourite female lead characters!


I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a vampire story that has a different plot, and lots of originality!


Rating:
Characters: 5/5
Plot: 5/5
Originality: 5/5
Writing: 4.5/5

     Bubbles!

Overall,