Wednesday, June 22, 2011

The Van Alen Legacy by Melissa De La Cruz

GENRE

YA Urban Fantasy / Vampire (369 pgs.)


SYNOPSIS

With the stunning revelation surrounding Bliss's true identity comes the growing threat of the sinister Silver Bloods. Once left to live the glamorous life in New York City, the Blue Bloods now find themselves in an epic battle for survival. Not to worry; love is still in the air for the young vampires of the Upper East Side. Or is it? Schuyler has made her choice. She has forsaken Jack for Oliver, choosing human over vampire. But old loves die hard... And even coldhearted Mimi seems to suffer from the ties that bind.


MY REVIEW

Here again we have a memorable, unique departure from the over-saturated vampire world that is YA Fantasy. Although I can commend this series for its uniqueness, this installment absolutely was not up to par.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

The first problem I had was that the characters in this novel are far from believeable. Especially the character of Mimi Force, or the angel Azrael, as she is so deemed. This pampered socialite is really a two faced character, and not in a good way. Throughout this story Mimi is pulled away from her destiny bound vampire mate, Jack, to a handsome, reformed Silver Blood (the evil kind) vampire Kingsley. Just as Mimi and Jack are about to be "bonded" together (think of a wedding, but vampire style), Mimi realizes she can't go through with it, as she sees Kingsley lurking in the shadows. Then come to find out, when Mimi realizes her bondmate Jack actually loves someone else as well, she decides that Jack has "forsaken his duty" and she has to kill him for violating the Sacred Law. I just found this to be completely unreasonable and unbelieveable.

Our protagonist Schuyler was really nothing special in this story. She treats her human conduit (guardian) Oliver terribly, runs around the world always longing for home, and really doesn't get involved much as far as important plot functions go.

The plot was also really unbelieveable too. Everything just seemed to "fall into place" too naturally, you know? Like there was never any real challeneges. And I could have guessed the ending a mile away.

The only thing really redeeming about this novel was Bliss's story. When we left her in the last novel, we found out she was being inhabited by the demon Leviathan, who was using her to kill all the Blue Bloods. In this book, it was really refreshing to see the heart-wrenching agony she went through to slowly but surely regain control of her own thoughts and actions.

There really wasn't much to enjoy about this book, unfortunately. You know when you get the feeling of intense satisfaction after finishing a novel in a series, and you are dying to get the next book? Yeah, I don't have that.


MY RATING

2.5**/*



No comments:

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails