Author: Richelle Mead

Series: Bloodlines

Genre: Fantasy

Publisher: Razorbill

Pages: 448

Bloodlines is a spinoff series from Mead’s beloved Vampire Academy series. It centers around the same Moroi world, and we see a lot of the same characters that were introduced in the original series, but this time the story is being told from the Alchemist, Sydney’s, point of view. This story picks up almost right where Last Sacrifice left off. Jill is being targeted by rogue Moroi who don’t want Lissa on the throne, so she has to be moved in to hiding at a human private school in Palm Springs. Sydney, still in trouble after her role in helping Rose out of her ordeal, is tapped to play her older sister to help keep her safe. Eddie, Rose’s dhampir friend (whose status is also still in question after the events in Last Sacrifice) is also along to guard Jill. To further complicate Sydney’s world, Adrian is in Palm Springs to “help” and keep an eye on Jill. There are a lot of issues that are uncovered along the way, between Sydney and the Alchemist in charge of the area, Keith. Along with the issue of keeping Jill safe, there are some other odd things happening in the Palm Springs area that Sydney is determined to figure out.

Sydney is a very different type of narrator than Rose was, but that is good because she has a very different view point. I wasn’t too sure about having the VA story told from the Alchemist POV, because I thought that it may be a bit jaded, but Sydney’s feelings kind of caught me off guard. I won’t say that I like it as much as VA, from this first story, but I did enjoy it. I’ll keep reading it to see if it keeps growing on me.