Pride comes before the fall.
When
a boarding school opens in a once-condemned Victorian manor buried in
the woods of New Hampshire, Austen-loving Lorena Navarro enrolls in
hopes of finding her own Mr. Darcy. Instead, she stumbles across a
coffin and accidentally awakens the world’s last vampire.
After
hibernating for nearly three centuries, William Pride is desperate to
find his family—and clueless about the modern world. Relying on Lorena
for more than just blood, he enrolls at the school to catch up on all
he’s missed.
Soon, William uncovers a chilling truth: He is the
last hope for his kind’s return to power. Torn between protecting the
humans around him and fulfilling his fate, William must make a choice
that could change everything. Will he sacrifice his species for love . .
. or will he embrace his dark destiny at last?
I received this ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest and voluntary review. I was in no way compensated for this review.
The Last Vampire is my first book by Romina Garber but certainly won't be my last. The title is what naturally drew me to this book because who could resist a book about vampires? While there were some common tropes and themes in this book, it's almost expected with a vampire romance, but it was still an entertaining story nonetheless.
Lorena Navarro and her best friend, Salma have received a scholarship to a very elite private school for their senior year. The school is an up and coming new private school that hopes to open to all high school students but for its first year, they are only teaching seniors. There were other odd happenstances occurring, such as no cell service or wifi, which seems odd in this day where technology runs rampant in education, but there were obvious reasons behind it.
Lorena and Salma both have a past that they are trying to escape from, which is how they landed at this elite school. They make new friends and on their first night, they break curfew to sneak around the school into the off limit areas and discover a secret library filled with strange books...and a coffin. A coffin that is not empty and contains one hungry vampire.
In the chaos of it all, Lorena is left behind and the vampire essentially makes her his familiar as he tries to comes to grip with the new reality he has awaken in. William was in a death sleep, a sort of prolonged sleep, but he can't remember why he was in it. So trying to adjust to a new world and new century is hard coming and he will need help navigating it and its new rules, hence the reason for letting Lorena live (as she made a cause for herself).
The story was interesting, I will give it that. Yes, we see those age old tropes of humans and vampires falling in love. We all know how those end, either in heartbreak or turnings. But William and Lorena's love story takes quite a bit of time as the two were thrust into an unbeatable situation. Their enemies to lovers journey takes quite a bit of time, which is the best way of doing it in my opinion. I've never been big on the insta-love trend.
The story is told through Lorena and William's points of view and I have to say, William's were the far more interesting chapters to read. Mainly because he is an age old vampire and he has quite a bit of history in his memory. One that will paint a different picture over American history as we know it. This aspect I found very intriguing and would've loved to know more about it, in a sense, but I can see why we didn't get as much detail because otherwise the book would've been lengthy with the history lessons.
The pacing to this book was a bit of an up and down rollercoaster. There were times when things were building up to really thrilling moments, or suspenseful happenings and then things would mellow out for awhile until the next turn. There were quite a few shocking surprises along the way, ones that I was able to predict and others I was pretty off on!
The ending was puzzling, but satisfying. As it stands, I believe we are looking at a standalone. But there is just enough tidbits here and there that there could be something more in the future if Garber decides to go down that path. If not, we are still left with a remarkable ending! Although, one teeny tiny thing that happened to a secondary character kind of threw me a bit, but it's nothing to fret over! I was just like where did that come from? But there you go!
If you're looking for that age old vampire romance story, then The Last Vampire is the book for you! Yes, you will see some of those common and overly used tropes from the vampire love stories of old, but it's still entertaining to see what other authors will do with these common themes. You can only do so much "new" with vampires, but I find all the stories to be unique in their own way. So if you're aching for the return of the vampires, like I have been, then be sure to add this one to your reading list!
Overall Rating 4/5 stars
The Last Vampire releases December 2, 2025
