Lissa or Dimitri? Dimitri or Lissa? Why cannot it ever be Lissa and Dimitri? This is what Rose finds herself wondering as at the end of book three she find herself having to choose. And when she picked Dimitri over Lissa, it tore her heart into pieces. Yet you cannot change the past, so Rose pushes on with one thought in mind: to kill Dimitri’s Strigoi.

This is how Rose finds herself in Russia. Going on a hint from Mason’s ghost she believes she’ll find Dimitri in his home town the “blood whore village” somewhere in Russia. Yet Russia is a big place so her ‘hint’ is basically unless. But it is a start. It was not till she met Sydney an Alchemist (someone she would have learned about when she graduated) who help set her on the right track to Dimitri’s family home. There she falls in love with his family. The simpler life of going home, working in a store and not having to be a guardian protecting moroi. Yet this life is perfect except for one thing. Abe. Abe is a moroi who has taken special interest in Rose. She believes the academy, or her mother (highly unlikely though) has sent him to bring her back to the Academy. After she got into a fight with Dimitri’s sister, she flees the village and continues on her quest to find Dimitri. Yet when she does find him, her heart and mind tears her open. As she sees the love of her life want her, yet does not love her.

This book is one of the twist and turns. You get to experience Rose and Dimitri love in a new less romantic way. You realize how Strigoi act, talk, look, think and yet not feel like the person before they “awakened”. Richelle Mead writing gets better and better and Rose life taken new turns yet ends with a happy but scary ending. I especially love who Abe turns out to be since that’s exactly what Rose needs. Yet what Rose has to ask herself in the end and as the reader what you need to answer: do you believe in fairy tales?