★★★ ½ #Bloodlines
Oscillating between loathing the characters in this book and loving the twists in the book, I finally settled on 3.5 stars. I read the Vampire Academy first and really enjoyed that series. I added this series as soon as it came out and for some reason, it took me over a decade to finally read it. Maybe my review and thoughts would have been different earlier. Who knows?
Sydney who is a secondary yet key character in the original series now has her own series. She too now has to be in a school as part of her "job". I liked Sydney. I get her and I felt she was given a raw deal. At times I wanted to just tell the girl, "Let them all suffer without your aid and see how it works". There are several characters in this book that drive me crazy. The way they treat Sydney so poorly makes me want to teach her the art of BITCHCRAFT. Because she really needs a few lessons in it and I have my doctorate degree in it.
If you loved the original series, you will probably enjoy this one because the setup is similar in characters and a school setting. I found the school setting to be pretty cool for Sydney. I liked how she integrated in especially from a home schooled kid. Her willingness to have the answers is fantastic. I like how she thinks and puts things together. Ms. Mead made it easy to figure out what is going on and who was doing what. There are a couple of surprising in here that caught me off guard and I loved it. Both surprises near the end make me want to read the rest of this series. I would say the last 25% of the book is what really pushed the rating higher up for me.
As a side note: I also worried that a character who needed to be slammed down would get away scot free. I am so happy this book included more details about the character. It is nice to see several subplots come to conclusion whilst longer plots are building momentum. Recommended for paranormal readers who enjoy YA themes and a female protagonist growing into her own.
