Vampire Dreams (Smart Novels: Vocabulary)

I was looking for this book for years. Thank you for sending the book right away!

Great book! I purchased it to study GRE words. I took a GRE prep course and words from this book were definitely covered in class. The words are not awkwardly forced in the story line and I like this format because it allows me to understand the definition of a word in a sentence which i was having to look up previously and write it our on flash cards.This is the second book i have purchased from the publisher. Very interesting and fun way to learn the words.

Purchased for my niece to help her prepare for SAT. She said story was interesting and definitely helped with vocabulary.

I read this in high school. Made prepping for the SATS less painful.

Awesome for a high school classroom library.

James Weston never wanted to become a vampire. He didn't even know that his mother was one until the night she changed him without even asking. After waking up from the horrible experience of having his neck bitten and being forced to drink the blood of his mother, James began his education on being a vampire. His mother's friend, Alistair, took him to his estate and began his training along with two other newly-turned vampires named Susan and Adam. Susan seemed to understand James' reluctance to succumb to the freedoms of the vampire life, but Adam, on the other hand, was the exact monster that James envisioned a true vampire would be. James realized he couldn't fit into the life his mother and the others wanted for him so he decided to leave and hopefully disappear in New York City. James never wanted to be found.Before being turned into a vampire, James had plans of becoming a doctor. He tried to attend classes, but realized it would be difficult with all the human blood he would come into contact with so he decided to give up the medical field and focus on plants. Even though he didn't need money since his father left him a sizable inheritance after his death, James usually had a couple of students he tutored each semester. That was how he met Victoria. The minute he saw her, his life changed. It had been five years since he left Alistair and the others and except for his cat, Solitaire, he didn't have any friends. Meeting Victoria made him realize he wanted companionship and someone to love. He just couldn't trust himself around her, which drove him crazy. Each time they got close he could smell the blood running through her veins and wanted to do nothing except bite her neck and taste her sweet blood.Everything in New York was fine until a serial killer began to strike. He leaves his victims drained of blood, which leads the media to call him the Vampire Killer. On top of all of his feelings for Victoria and the Vampire Killer being on the loose, James thinks he sees Adam. Eventually his fears are confirmed when Adam starts hanging around Victoria. James is scared for Victoria's safety, but is caught between a rock and hard place because he can't tell her the truth about the reason Adam is dangerous. Life becomes even more hazardous for James when other people from his past find him and force him to face some unwanted truths.VAMPIRE DREAMS: A SparkNotes SAT Vocabulary Novel is an interesting story even though it is a little forced at times because of trying to fit in all the difficult vocabulary. It didn't interrupt the flow of the story at all to look at the bottom of the page to check the definition of each of the boldface words that was used in the story. VAMPIRE DREAMS is a story not only for people studying for the SAT, but for everyone who is a fan of the vampire genre.Reviewed by: Karin Perry

If you ever want to frustrate the hell out of your students, assign something from this series of books. The writing is just awful; it's terribly affected and nonsensical at times, as if someone typed up a bland story and then used the thesaurus function on their word processor to cram in as many SAT words as possible without any regard for proper usage or flow. Words are learned through context. While there are occasions where words are contextualized effectively, many occasions were not. What's the point of using an abstruse word if I have to look it up anyway?If you want to expand your vocabulary, you're better off making flash cards AND writing your own practice sentences on the back. Believe me, this is way more fun and effective than reading a poorly written book. Make your sentences truly memorable or absurd (you'll remember them that way), but make sure the sentence provides some kind of context for the word at the same time (tautology actually isn't bad in this one instance if it helps you remember to pair similar words).

I am a teacher of students who have a relatively low vocabulary and struggle with de-coding and learning words in context. This series is AMAZINGLY helpful! My students are chewing through these books and wanting more. AWESOME! The only down side is this story is a little 'out there.' The kids love the ease with which they can learn new words and see them used. It isn't a perfect environment for thorough vocab learning, but they are a wonderful place to start!