Review: The Golden Lily by Richelle Mead

The Golden Lily
(Bloodlines #2)
Author: Richelle Mead
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication: June 12, 2012
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal, Fantasy, Romance
My Rating:

Sydney Sage is an Alchemist, one of a group of humans who dabble in magic and serve to bridge the worlds of humans and vampires. Alchemists protect vampire secrets – and human lives.

Sydney would love to go to college, but instead, she’s been sent into hiding at a posh boarding school in Palm Springs, California – tasked with protecting Moroi princess Jill Dragomir from assassins who want to throw the Moroi court into civil war. Formorly in disgrace, Sydney is now praised for her loyalty and obedience, and held up as the model of an exemplary Alchemist.

But the closer she grows to Jill, Eddie, and especially Adrian, the more she finds herself questioning her age-old Alchemist beliefs, her idea of family, and her sense of what it means to truly belong. Her world becomes even more complicated when magical experiments show Sydney may hold the key to prevent becoming Strigoi – the fiercest vampires, the ones who don’t die. But it’s her fear of being just that – special, magical, powerful – that scares her more than anything. Equally daunting is her new romance with Braydon, a cute, brainy guy who seems to be her match in every way. Yet, as perfect as he seems, Sydney finds herself being drawn to someone else – someone forbidden to her.

When a shocking secret threatens to tear the vampire world apart, Sydney’s loyalties are suddenly tested more than ever before. She wonders how she’s supposed to strike a balance between the principles and dogmas she’s been taught, and what her instincts are now telling her.

Should she trust the Alchemists – or her heart?

Another successful buddyread with my sis Bea. You’ll see her beautiful review when you click her name. 🙂

One word to fully describe the awesomeness of this book: ADRIAN.

Holy craaap! This boy is one of the best, swoon-worthy fictional guys and it’s so unfair we could not see him in the flesh!

After reading this book, I was left utterly speechless and blown away. It was way too good! Most sequels in a series tend to give me some doubts with their potentials because oftentimes an author changes his or her tune and the end product sometimes disappoints me. But in this sweet, sweet sequel, I put all my faith and 100% belief that it will turn out good and I was right. It was one of the most amazing installments in a series. Because Richelle Mead apparently does not disappoint.

I loved how The Golden Lily lived up to the interesting plot and romance that made the first book Bloodlines an enjoyable read. In this book, Sydney Sage and Adrian Ivashkov‘s character was greatly developed as they continued to hide under the radar of the enemies of St. Vladimir Academy. There were lots of things that happened here and new characters were introduced, too.

I wasn’t disappointed with the way things had panned out in this book. The plotline was so good and the pacing was fast. No dull moments as well. It was also nice to see the (non-insta-love) romantic development between Sydney and Adrian. Their romance, in a way, was slow-burning and tension-fueled and I totally loved it!

What also basically got me hooked was how likable the characters were. Sydney is a female lead that I will love to befriend in real life because she is so smart, determined, and mature. I loved how she has this positive attitude that everything can be done– no matter how difficult that thing is. She especially encourages and inspires Adrian to be the best that he can be, and that is something. Adrian is also one great male lead. Since Vampire Academy, this guy already took my breath away because of his humor and romantic gestures. He didn’t change in this series. In fact, his character became even better!

I also loved the humor and the witty exchange of dialogues here. When you pair Sydney and Adrian together, everything collides so perfectly!!!

Apart from that, Richelle Mead also made this book even more interesting because of the side characters like Eddie, Jill,Angeline, Sonya, Trey, Dimitri, etc. The value of friendship and family love was so touching!

These are my favorite lines from Adrian that basically knocked me off my feet:

“I tried to be a better person for her (Rose)– but it was to impress her, to get her to want me. But when I’m around you, I want to be better because… well, because it feels right. Because I want to. You make me want to become something greater than myself. I want to excel. You inspire me in every act, every word, every glance. I look at you, and you’re like… like light made into flesh. You have no clue how beautiful you are or how brightly you shine.”

*gasps

All in all, I had a great time with The Golden Lily. After reading it, all I wanted to do was read the next book which is The Indigo Spell. 🙂 It was just everything I wanted in a sequel!

Rating:

Buy this book at:

READ ALL MY REVIEWS HERE