Blue Bloods: Number 1 in series (Blue Bloods, #1)

by Melissa de la Cruz

They're Young, Fabulous and Fanged. . .

And they rule Manhattan from the trendy uptown clubs to the downtown boutiques. Fifteen-year-old Schuyler Van Alen has never quite fit in at her exclusive prep school - she's more of a vintage than a Versace girl - but all that's about to change. . .

Because Schuyler has just found out she's a Blue Blood. The Blue Bloods are the city's glamorous - and secret - vampire elite. They're young, beautiful and powerful. But now they're being murdered. And Schuyler must find out who - or what - is behind it before she's next.

• ISBN10: 190565474X
• ISBN13: 9781905654741
• Publish Date: 22 February 2010 (first published 1 May 2006)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
• Imprint: ATOM
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 336
• Language: English

Reviews

[Baroness Book Trove]

CAUTION! THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE BOOK ALREADY!!!!!!!


When I first started this book I didn't read the back of it. I just saw the cover and thought of maybe vampires are going after humans in Manhattan. But after I got a little bit further in it I stopped to read the back of it. I was shocked but I was also too far into the book to stop. I was really interested in it.


Melissa de la Cruz in my head is a really good author and I love this book series even though I just started it. I will give this book a five stars as this is a good book and one that I would recommend to anyone. This books is awesome and gives a good twist on vampires and something else that I won't want to ruin for anyone else that wants to read this book.

[Katie King]

**2 stars**

First and foremost, ignore the plot synopsis. Technically everything mentioned does happen, but it really isn't an accurate description of the book. I think it's a little misleading because it makes it seem like we get a glimpse of these Pilgrim vampires meeting and vowing to keep their nature a secret, but no, that is what happens. Instead we get intermittent flashbacks to the time of early settlers via a diary, but never any concrete information. There is mention of the first Pilgrims as vampires but John Alden? Constance Hopkins? Those people are never mentioned in the book. The Pilgrim thing more just rounds out the plot with a background story. And Schuyler as a loner? She actually has a few friends that she enjoys spending time with, and by the end of the novel she has gained many more. We don't see her discovering the veins on her arms - when they are first mentioned it is implied Schuyler has had them for a while. Ignore the plot synopsis.

Moving on, this book reads as "Gossip Girl" with vampires on the side. I should know - I've watched the entire series. The brand-dropping in this book is ridiculously annoying. I tried to read the Clique series in middle school and I didn't make it past the first book for the same reason. I get that letting your readers know exactly what lifestyle these kids have is important, but at some point there's a line and de la Cruz crossed it. Also mentioned are lavish parties, expensive shopping trips, endless drama, and snobby teenagers. Like I said, Gossip Girl.

A very small portion of the book is dedicated to introducing and developing the vampire plotline, which really suffers. Kids find out they're vampires with blood that's magically alive and carries memories of past lives, but all that is forgotten in comparison to figuring out whom everyone is hooking up with. A "popular girl" (who appears in the novel only upon her death) gets all her blood sucked out and everyone goes from shocked to wondering who they should ask to the fall dance. The latest round of vampire kids definitely don't let their undead status affect their social lives.

The characters were boring and predictable. Schuyler fit neatly into the alternative stereotype. Bliss fit into the country girl stereotype. Mimi fit into the popular "bitch" stereotype. The male best friend secretly in love, the bad boy, the cold grandmother, and so on and so on...

Lastly, the romance. Obviously our little punk sweetheart Schuyler manages to fall deep in love after one chat with the popular jock who's "different" from the other popular kids. I guess different these days means a suggestive relationship with his twin sister. I can't decide whether or not it's worse because of the fact that he apparently loves Schuyler back. Then there's her best friend Oliver, who turns out to be something like "vampire's little helper." He also seems like he's in love with her, but of course she doesn't see it and routinely picks the jock over him. That love triangle is seriously worn out.

The best part of the book is when we actually read something relating to vampires. For an entire series based around them, they don't really feature prominently in this novel. I liked the whole backstory we get on them, the library, the flashbacks - that whole part was interesting. Problem is, we don't really see a lot of it.

If you like Gossip Girl, you'll love this book. If you're hoping for a better Twilight, this isn't your book. Lots of high school drama and not a lot of paranormal action. If it weren't for the fact that I had already bought the next book, I would be done with this series.

[violetpeanut]

Eh..it was ok. It was kind of like Gossip Girl plus vampires. This is the type of book to pick up if you want to read some fluff between heavier reads. There were some interesting takes on vampire mythology and lots of references to fashion and upper-crust New Yorkers. It's not great literature, but then, it's not meant to be. I'm sure I'll pick up the next in the series next time I need something light.

[Kelly]

http://divainpyjamas.blogspot.com.au/
One word: Boring. Blue Bloods is a tame vampire tale, unique in how vampires came to be, and how the live within guidelines of secret societies. I love the concept, but not the execution.

Told from several points of view, we get a glimpse of each character, but I couldn't connect to any of them. Most if the book is brand name dropping and detailed descriptions of designer outfits, bags, outings, it's all very vain and shallow. I would have preferred to see that better spent in character development. It was too frustrating and although I persisted through Blue Bloods, I won't be continuing the series.

Follow my book review blog at http://missbookreviews.wordpress.com/

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Dun, dun, dun! Another vampire series!

This one had a very interesting history for vampires. Definitely not the usual history. I liked that.

However, I didn’t like how it was written in the points of view of so many people. That made the story drag on. It didn’t feel like there was much of a story because you just kept reading the different points of view of the same situation. Kind of.

I felt like I couldn’t connect with any of the characters because there were so many and because you kept switching to the different points of view so often so you didn’t really have a chance. I wish it had been in the point of view of Schuyler only, it wouldn’t have been so confusing and you would have gotten into the story a lot more. Plus you would have taken way more of a liking to her.

The story was very slow to start off. It doesn’t really start to till the middle of the book. Which kind of sucked because I didn’t enjoy it as much as other vampire stories. The whole first half is setting up the story and that was just boring to read.

The end half was better and more entertaining, although I felt like the relationships between the characters suddenly started and stopped unrealistically. The reveal was a little confusing, especially with the history of vampires. Then because there were so many characters’ points of views you didn’t really feel for any character in particular, not even Schuyler which was disappointing.

I liked it enough to want to read the second book in the series though!

Miss J
x

[Amber (The Literary Phoenix)]

I surprised myself by loving this book.

I find that the summary on the back of the book is a little misleading - Blue Bloods follows not only the story of Schuyler Van Allen, but also the stories of Bliss Llewellyn and Madeline Force ("Mimi"). There are enough cliches to make it familiar, but few enough so that the pieces of originality stood out well. At the beginning, I was afraid that De La Cruz was going to dive into intense descriptions of clothes (hey-lo upper class, teenage NYC!), but she only did so when was appropriate, and in the voice of the one character who would actually care about something like that - Mimi. There isn't a single mention of a name-brand that Schuyler is wearing (excepting, of course, her modelling campaign, but her discomfort is clear the whole time).

The summary on the back of the book implies that this is a paranormal mystery, but the story itself seems to be more coming-of-age... except it's not about growing up... it's about becoming a vampire.

There were enough unique aspects in this book to make it feel fresh in a world that is torn between sparkly emo vampires (Meyer), and vicious, cunning vampires (Rice). She uses enough of the traditional aspects to remain true to the folklore, but explains away everything that doesn't fit. Even if she doesn't use aspects like garlic, etc., then I appreciate the fact she finds a justification for not using them. New aspects, such as the flashbacks and reincarnation? That's just cool.

However, there are points that are a little cheesy - Gabriel and Michael, for starters. Also, Oliver felt too flat after revealing his secret, as though knowing that sucked his character dry for me, and that was a little disappointing.

This book is great for people who want to read a light vampire flick, who aren't forcefully invented in "vampire" as the word is defined by another author, and as always with YA... people who can dissociate themselves from an adult mindset and recognize that the main characters may have souls as old as time, but their bodies and maturity level aren't quite as old.

I will be picking up the next book in this series, and I hope it delivers.

((Cross-posted on my blog: The Literary Phoenix))

[inlibrisveritas]

Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz is the first book in the Blue Blood series. Basically the whole books premise is about vampires who are in the highest platform of society, hence the double meaning of Blue Blood. It focuses on a group of young high school age kids that attend a prep school in New York that are slowly being drawn into the world of the Blue Bloods. However all is not well as they soon learn that something is targeting the Blue Bloods and they need to find out who.

In general I'd say this book has a lot of potential. The author has a talent for writing and that much is very obvious, however you can also tell that she works for a fashion magazine because a lot of that talent goes into describing the clothes and possessions each person has. I found this to be annoying in general as it continues throughout the whole book, but it wasn't enough for me to hate it because it is written better then most teenage vampire books. This is like a combination of Gossip Girls and Vampire Diaries, so it has the possibility of being addictive. It's a very easy to read book regardless of the constant fashion talk and it's possible to get through it quickly. Also unlike other books it's written in 3rd person and doesn't focus on just one person which is a refreshing when it comes to adding variety to the plot. Another refreshing quality is the fact that it's not all about romance as it is in other teen vamp fiction, this has a plot that takes the front position and the romance is kind of a plus. The characters are relate-able on a caste type of level as they can come off as shallow or wishy-washy.

Personally I'll give this book a 3 out of 5. Overall I did enjoy the book when it wasn't talking about the oh so fabulous clothing world. The plot to me was kind of different and there are a lot of different qualities to it that you don't find many places among the young adult genre. I must admit that for some reason that gossip factor of the book is kind of addicting no matter how much I think this to be on the lower scale of brain use, so that definitely gives it brownie points. I do like it more then Twilight which seems to be the basis for most comparisons these days, and I'll give the second book a go. However I must say that if the second book is on the same level as the first then there is a good chance I won't move on to the third, I enjoyed it but I don't think I can take a lot high elite gossip and fashion talk.