Author: Richelle Mead
Publisher: Razorbill
Total Pages: 432
Pages Read: 50
Why I stopped: Here's the thing. If you read the Vampire Academy novels, you'll probably like this one. I just felt so behind the whole time I was reading. I don't know the setting well enough to just dive right in. I understand that the author couldn't cram a whole series of knowledge into the first fifty pages of a book, but I needed to be less bombarded with details of the world, and needed to understand the characters better. Bloodlines is definitely a spin-off of Vampire Academy - on the Alchemist vein. I just read fifty pages and had no idea what an Alchemist really did. I had no idea why Sydney Sage wanted to keep her sister away from the life, only that she wanted to desperately. And I couldn't help but feel that if I had read the Vampire Academy books, I wouldn't feel like I was struggling to keep up. There was too much history for me to just dive right in. I kept using Monster as a reference tool, asking him to explain stuff, and that got annoying.
What I did like: It was an interesting and intriguing concept. The characters and their relationships seemed really complex and well-developed. I liked the conflict that arose from Sydney not being able to say goodbye to her mother. I liked that she was so protective of her sister, and eager to redeem herself for past actions (which I didn't read far enough to understand what she did). I liked the prose, and the concise language.
Would I reccommend? Only if you've read Vampire Academy.
