Bloodlines Review

Bloodlines by Richelle Mead
Series: Bloodlines #1
Published by Razorbill on August 23rd 2011
Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Vampires, Young Adult
Pages: 421
Format: Audiobook
Goodreads

Blood doesn't lie...

Sydney is an alchemist, one of a group of humans who dabble in magic and serve to bridge the worlds of human and vampires. They protect vampire secrets - and human lives. When Sydney is torn from her bed in the middle of the night, at first she thinks she's still being punished for her complicated alliance with dhampir Rose Hathaway. But what unfolds is far worse. Jill Dragomir - the sister of Moroi Queen Lissa Dragomir - is in mortal danger, and the Moroi must send her into hiding. To avoid a civil war, Sydney is called upon to act as Jill's guardian and protector, posing as her roommate in the last place anyone would think to look for vampire royalty - a human boarding school in Palm Springs, California. But instead of finding safety at Amberwood Prep, Sydney discovers the drama is only just beginning...

 Julie’s Review:

Bloodlines is my first spin-off type novel. I really enjoyed the Vampire Academy series (Dimitri is my book boyfriend) and so after having this series recommended to me for some time, decided to give it a try. This first book was pretty good, but not as good as I was expecting. It didn’t move the same way as the later VA books did, but I wonder if that was due to having to re-build the world for any newcomers to this spin-off. I’m sure there are plenty of people that read this as a first in a series without having read the VA series. In any case, I felt it moved a bit slowly for my tastes and there wasn’t enough excitement.

The major plot is that Sydney, our Alchemist from the VA series, is working to protect Jill (Queen Lissa’s sister) by posing her as a human in a regular boarding school in Palm Springs – hiding in plain sight kind of thing. There were two major conflicts not having to do with Jill in this book, and I have to say my disappointment is that I figured them out before Sydney did. She’s this super smart girl, but she was oblivious for most of the book while I as the reader kept seeing hint after hint of something not being right about two particular characters. I think that is what made it frustrating.

But let’s talk about what I did like. Adrian is awesome. Seriously, his sarcastic comments are so enjoyable and I am very glad he’s a major character in this spin-off series. I liked him in VA but I like him even more now.

The audio narrator is pretty good for this series. I’m not a fan of some of her male voices – she makes some of the more annoying characters sound like they’re yelling, which makes them even more annoying. But otherwise, she does good voices and I like how easy it is to distinguish who is speaking.

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