Blue Bloods: Keys to the Repository by Melissa De La Cruz

There are some reviews that contain spoilers...while this one, does not.  This book would be hard to review really if I did give away spoilers in this review.

And how can you spoil a companion book anyway?  Probably the easiest book for me to review because of the non-spoilerage (is that even a word?  Well, if it isn't, it is now.)

Okay, well as I began this book, I really didn't know what to expect from it.  I mean, it's Blue Bloods: Keys to the Repository.  You would think it was a new book for the series when in fact it is more like the encyclopedia that accompanies the first four books of the series by Melissa De La Cruz.  I loved that she did this part way through the series.  It will make the other stories afterwards make a lot more sense.

Like I said, this is a companion book.  Some authors have these to accompany their series, and the author, Melissa De La Cruz, cites one in this book.  Stephen King.  I didn't even know that Stephen King would do something like this for his books.  Then again, I don't read Stephen King because he is a brilliant author, but he also scares me to death if I did read his works.  Melissa begins the book with a letter to the reader which I found fabulous because it is really her telling the reader why she did this for the series.

Throughout the book you read more on the information that the Blue Blood coven in New York has on all the main characters and their family and what their previous lives were, whose blood they would suck on once in a while and who their bondmate would be.  I LOVED THIS!  It also gave a more defined description with simple, blunt, to the point descriptions of what the characters would look like.

Everything with this book is fabulous and actually helps me understand the author herself as well.  What's even better with this book is that she added some other character's point of views during certain scenes that happened through books 1-4 of the series that aren't in the actual books.  You get a better sense at who these characters are and what will or won't happen later on in the series.

And then she has the glossary in the back and definitions and descriptions of things that don't need a large explanation, but should be in there anyway.  If you read the Blue Bloods series, add this to your list to read after The Van Alen Legacy because then things will make more sense as you go on with Misguided Angel that will be released in October this year.  Happy Reading!

Oh and aren't the covers for this series AMAZING?  I think so.  They make my shelf look so mysterious and beautiful at the same time.

Masquerade (A Blue Bloods Novel)

I can't believe it has been so long since I've written a review.  However, this book is what has taken me so long to get to.  Masquerade by Melissa De La Cruz haunted my nightstand until I finished it.  I would stare at it and realize that if I picked it up, I would have to sit down and finish it.  Every time I looked at it while reading it, I would have this problem.

Usually, that's the best sign a book is addicting.

I'm hooked.  I thought Blue Bloods, the first in the series, reeled me in but this book hooked me.  I think the worm is the cover of this book.  Just very mysterious with the eyes behind the beautiful mask. 

Here's a quick synopsis of what the story is about and I promise to try and not give too much away.

Masquerade, begins where Blue Bloods left off.  Doesn't every sequel do this somehow?  Anyway, we've met the characters, Bliss Llewellyn, Schuyler Van Alen, Mimi Force, Jack Force, and many others who come into more play. 

As many teenagers do, they all have social problems with themselves and with others around them.  Mimi is jealous of Jack paying more attention to Schuyler than to her even though they are "bonded" which means in their past lives, they were together as husband and wife, etc.  You get the drift.  Mimi decides early on that Schulyer needs to go away some how.  But how?

And Bliss is frightened by red eyes in her sleep giving her nightmares, and with her many different places she is going in the middle of the night in sleepwalker mode.  And who was her real mother?  The one her father never talked about.  Where did Dylan go?  What happened to him?

Then there is Schuyler, the half blood, the outcast of all the socialie scene in the Blue Blood world.  Although she is one of the top teen models in New York now, she is attracted to Jack more than ever and really looking for answers about Croatan or also known as, Silver Bloods.  Going to Venice with her best friend, Oliver, to find her grandfather, she learns throughout the story--as well as everyone else does--that she is more like her mother, Allegra Van Alen, than ever before.  She is, or may possibly be the strongest of the Blue Bloods and also, the only one that could defeat the Silver Bloods if they ever rose up and took to war.

Of course, these three mini storylines all mingle together and weave in and out of each throughout the book.  Every page is a turner, and I know I had to look ahead always and read the last paragraphs of certain chapters to see if they may leave me hanging or they would let me be.

As always in gripping stories, I could only find maybe one or two spots that I was comfortable putting the book down and waiting for the perfect day to sit down and read some more.

Even if you read, Blue Bloods, and like it in a mediocre way the way I did, go and pick up Masquerade, and just try to not read this in one sitting.  Luckily, I did it that way, but then again, it also took me weeks to get through it since I feared I would leave my motherly duties in order to read this book.

Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz

I never thought I would read another vampire book after reading, The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer.  However, I had heard so much about the Blue Bloods books by Melissa De La Cruz that I had to get the first two books.   First there is Blue Bloods and second there is Masquerade.  I will have to review the second later as I have just started to read it.

In Blue Bloods, Melissa does a great job bringing a society of vampires to life.  These vampires are not your typical vampires.  They can go out in the sun, they're not as pale as we think vampires to be, they don't glitter in the sun like diamonds, and their fangs aren't in the front of their mouth like traditional Dracula.  However, these are the creme de la creme of the vampire world.  These vampires own most of Manhattan, New York. 

The story is in third person and follows first and foremost, Schuyler Van Alen as she learns about being a Blue Blood and tries to figure out her life as a teenager with her best friend, Oliver, who is human.  But Melissa also shows us the story in other character views such as the new Texas transfer, Bliss Llewellyn who is also the daughter of a New York senator and Mimi Force, the most popular girl on private school, Duschesne's campus.

Along the way, we learn that vampires are fallen angels with Michael and Gabriel (the archangels) as their leaders to help them through their lives on earth.  Also, these vampires that Melissa has created always save a bit of their blue blood in order for them to reincarnate and return to life later on.  And they learn about Croatan or the thing that wiped out the Roanoke colony back when Plymouth was first established.

I have to say that I did enjoy the story Melissa De La Cruz has come up with.  However, I'm not into all the talk of Gossip Girl like stories.  Probably the best character this author has come up with in this story is Bliss.  Bliss is very down to earth and reminds me very much of how girls really react to their surroundings when they are in their teen years.  Mimi Force is way on the popular side with really no worries except how to plan the next big party and then there is Schuyler who is our main character, but on the opposite end of Mimi, being the most unpopular girl at school and dressing like a goth.  Nothing wrong with goths, I have nothing against them, but I see that I like Bliss because we see the conflict in her as she tries to choose which side to be on, Schuyler's or Mimi's.

I really do like the innovative take on vampires.  They are definitely new and the story really wasn't as predictable as I thought it would be.  She even ends it on a climactic point.  I think what could have made this story more interesting is smoother scene changes and more on the feelings on how these girls feel about being who they are.  I believe it would have added more depth to the story and to the characters themselves.  I'm not saying the story is really dry, I'm just saying that it has its high points but a lot of it is low points.  I have started the second book, Masquerade, and hope to enjoy it far more than I how I somewhat enjoyed Blue Bloods.

P.S. Sorry for the layout of this review...for some reason I can't get it to go the way I want it to look.