Monday 31 August 2015

Half-Blood by Jennifer L Armentrout

Half-Blood by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Rating: 3.5 stars

Synopsis: The Hematoi descend from the unions of gods and mortals, and the children of two Hematoi pure bloods have godlike powers. Children of Hematoi and mortals--well, not so much. Half-bloods only have two options: become trained Sentinels who hunt and kill daimons or become servants in the homes of the pures. Seventeen-year-old Alexandria would rather risk her life fighting than waste it scrubbing toilets, but she may end up slumming it anyway. There are several rules that students at the Covenant must follow. Alex has problems with them all, but especially rule #1:Relationships between pures and halfs are forbidden. Unfortunately, she's crushing hard on the totally hot pure-blood Aiden. But falling for Aiden isn't her biggest problem--staying alive long enough to graduate the Covenant and become a Sentinel is. If she fails in her duty, she faces a future worse than death or slavery: being turned into a daimon, and being hunted by Aiden. And that would kind of suck.

Review: It's been so long since I reviewed anything and I'm so sorry for that, but I'm back now and, to kick things off, a book that I thought I was going to absolutely love. But I didn't. If any of you are frequent visitors to this site, you will know that one of my all time favourite book series is the Lux series by Jennifer L. Armentrout. It was the first thing I'd ever read by Jennifer and I fell in love both with the characters and the plot but also with her writing style. I adore the Lux series so much that I was hesitant to pick up Half-Blood but, when I found it on offer in a local book store I couldn't resist. I was expecting to be reacquainted with the writing style that I'd fallen in love with previously. But it wasn't there. Don't get me wrong, the writing style was still really good, but there was an almost personal connection with Alex missing from the narration. In the Lux series, both Daemon and Katy are characters filled with attitude and sarcasm and that really comes across in the way the books are written, but this was missing for me in Half-Blood. Like I said, the style itself was still great and if I hadn't read the Lux series beforehand, I probably would have liked it a lot more, but I think the same writing style used in the Lux series would have worked equally well in Half-Blood.

I found the plot line itself was actually really similar to Richelle Mead's Vampire Academy series. Alex and Aiden are very similar to Rose and Dimitri in their traits and even their circumstances - Alex and Rose are Aiden and Dimitri's students - but I think I prefer Rose and Dimitri as characters. I think they have more chemistry than Alex and Aiden seem to and to me, Rose and Dimitri just seem a lot more kick-ass than Alex and Aiden. I did enjoy the references to the God's and the mythology aspect in general. It was obvious to me that Jennifer had really done her research and I thought that it merged really well into the plot line. In the few YA books I've read that have included mythology in the plot, I've found it can be a bit hit and miss - sometimes it really works and sometimes it really doesn't. I think that Half-Blood is a good example of where the use of mythology does work really well with the plot and is actually believable.

Saying that, I didn't think the plot itself was as enjoyable as the Lux series because of it's similarities to Vampire Academy. One of the major plot points is set out for you to guess and the other plot point involving Alex's mom is also pretty predictable and is kind of similar to Rose and Dimitri's situation, and again, I think I prefer the way the plot unfolded in Vampire Academy. Since I read this book on holiday, I haven't looked up which book was published first but, I read VA before I read Half-Blood. If you haven't read VA then you will probably enjoy the plot but for those of you who have read VA, you'll see what I mean if you do decide to give Half-Blood a try.

I also want to quickly talk about Caleb. As a character he really irritated me because he didn't add anything to the plot line. To me, he was too 'good'. There was no real conflict or tension added by his involvement in the plot. I know why Jennifer used him, especially in the end conflict but by then he was just dead weight to me. Maybe he'll be developed in the other books but, based solely on book 1, I'm not a fan of Caleb.

I'm still a huge fan of Jennifer L. Armentrout but, for me, I'd recommend you pick up the Lux series over the Covenant series. To me, the characters and plot are more developed and original and her writing style was a lot more interesting for me in the Lux series. If you're looking for a similar plot to Half-Blood, then pick up Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead - again, the plot and characters are just more developed to me than they were here. I really wanted to like Half-Blood as much as I adore Lux but, unfortunately, Half-Blood just didn't live up to my expectations.

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