Review: The Golden Lily by Richelle Mead

The second novel in Mead's Bloodlines series isn't a bad book. That said, I could not help but feel disappointed or feel that, somehow The Golden Lily failed to set the benchmark that was set by the first book in the series and it definitely strays a long way from the action packed Vampire Academy. The only thing that inspired me at all was the budding (and forbidden,) romance between Alchemist Sydney and bad boy Maroi Adrian. But perhaps I am being too harsh a critic?

Anyway, in this instalment, Sydney is still based at a boarding school in Palm Springs where she is protecting fifteen year old vampire princess, Jill. There are a couple of subplots involving witchcraft and Sydney's budding romance with the boring, human and unmemorable Brayden who ditches her anyway, but in this instalment the major threat to the Vampires and Alchemists is the Warriors, a group who have broken away from the Alchemists and basically get off on murdering the most harmless members of the Maroi they can find and fool themselves into believing that they are big, brave men. Sonja Karp is the unlucky vampire to get kidnapped and Sydney is the one who has to rescue her ... with a little help from her friends.

The Golden Lily is a decently written book, but it feels very much like a lack-lustre instalment in an otherwise good series, bridging the gap between Sydney's appointment in Palm Springs and her (probable) abandonment of the Alchemsts for witchcraft and a romance with Adrian, rather than a novel in its own right. 

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