Blue Bloods (Book One of Blue Bloods), by Melissa de la Cruz

Blue Bloods
Book One of Blue Bloods
Written by Melissa de la Cruz

"Black is the color of night. White is the true color of death." - Blue Bloods, Book One of Blue Bloods, by Melissa de la Cruz

I have to say that I had mixed feelings about this book. I felt it began really strong. There were all the earmarks of a good story, a little bit of suspense, a little bit of the supernatural, a little bit of witty repertoire. I did feel that it really broke down though about 2/3 of the way through the book. It was almost as if the author wrote the first 2/3 of the book and then stopped for some reason. The last 1/3 of the book was just different. It was obvious that the writer was not on the same wave length that they had been on when they wrote the previous chapters.

I found the change in style particularly appalling when it came to the characters personalities. Initially they were strong and vibrant, but then they metamorphosized into these weak willed and often cliché versions of their previous selves. I was not impressed by that change. I actually wondered if this was some sort of editing job gone awry because the writing style just changed so dramatically, but I haven't been able to find any evidence of this so far.

I found the descriptive part of the narrative to be quite good. I usually get irritated when authors try to "paint me a picture" of the surroundings like L.J. Smith was constantly doing in the last of the Vampire diaries books that she actually wrote (I have to say I understand why the publisher went with a ghostwriter). De la Cruz managed to do description it in a way that was colorful while managing to stay relevant, which really impressed me. Although I'm no New York socialite, her descriptions of the events and fashions were easy to picture and added rather than detracted from the story.

Despite the random change in perspective near the end of the book, I am dying to find out what happens next to this league of teenage immortals. I am hoping that, like the House of Night Series, the writing will improve with each book. De la Cruz already has already shown more writing talent initially than I saw in the first House of Night book, Marked, so I have high hopes for the rest of the series.