Half-Blood

Cool coverart (in my opinion)

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.

“Half-Blood“ was headspinningly awesome and not boring at all, but umm.. Yeah, there’s a big fat BUT. I’ve read all the books from Richelle Mead’s “Vampire Academy“ series (and many times for that matter) and I’m familiar with every single detail from this series, therefore, it was disturbing at times to find so many similarities between Jennifer L. Armentrout’s first book in the Covenant series and Richelle Mead’s novels.

To begin with, Aiden reminds me of Dimitri and Seth’s just like Adrian (when one doesn’t consider too much drinking and healing powers). Aiden trains Alex just as Dimitri trained Rose and both of these man are helping a younger girl out in order for them to achieve their potential and, by the way, both of these guys are the reason why these girls weren’t expelled from their schools. Feelings start to grow between both of these training couples and suprise, suprise – both of these relationships are forbidden. Very well, Dimitri’s and Rose’s obstacle is their big age difference and that the society frowns upon their relationship, because while it’s not actually forbidden by the law, both of them have to protect the last Dragomimr, Rose’s best friend, princess Lissa, and they do not want to jeopardize her life. In "Half-Blood", Aiden is a pureblood while Alex is a half-blood. Their relationship is forbidden by the law. At the beginning Rose didn’t feel anything for Adrian and Alexandria doesn’t feel anything but dislike for Seth, however, I have an itchy feeling that it won’t stay that way for long.

Then there’s the thing that purebloods are like morois from VA and they stand higher in the eyes of the society than half-bloods (and dampirs) and each of them have power over certain elements. Half-bloods are trained protectors and killers of daimons, doesn’t it sound familiar to the importance of dampirs who in the society of vampires protect morois and kill strigois? Furthermore, purebloods can be turned to daimons and daimons live to kill them, because they cannot survive without the aither that’s inside purebloods (although, they can feed on half-bloods, but it’s not that sattisfying and doesn’t give that much energy). It’s the same thing with strigois.

Okay, it is what it is, but the story itself is quite interesting and consuming from the very beginning. If you’ve read Mead’s series than it’s quite hard not to find parallels, but don't let that disturb you. Alex’s life is literally an affliction and I liked that she’s one of the strongest female characters I’ve read about for a very long time. Alexandria’s young, but remarkably strong. She's like Rose 2.0 and although no one can beat Ms. Hathaway in hew awesomeness, Alex would give her one hell of a fight on a battlefield and I honestly don't know who'd win this match. The girl’s got heart, spunk and spine more than an experienced adult has. Also, I liked how great of a friend Caleb was and how he supported Alex in every situation. She deserves a friend like him and he was definitely one of my favorite characters!

“Pure“, the sequel, is published in April and I’m looking forward to it already. Teasers, which Armentrout has published on her wepage, make my fingers long for the book and make my heart go faster, because they’re so interesting and awesome. Armentrout’s easy writing style is great to read, but I liked her style in “Obsidian“ a little better.

Anyway, it was a great read and if you’ve read about Richelle Mead’s vampire world, you’ll probably enjoy this one, too.

Armentrout posts a lot on her blog and she’s published the first and the second chapter from Aiden’s POV, also, the 16th chapter from his point of view. (I recommend you to read the book first, because these POVs might be too spoilery).

Excerpts:

“So? What are you going to do about it? Throw your mashed potatoes at me? I'm consumed by terror.”

“I was gonna be super pissed in the afterlife if I died a virgin in this crap hole.”

“Okay. I’m ready to move onto something else, like practicing with knives or defense against the dark arts. Cool things.”
“Did you just quote Harry Potter?”

“Are you lost? This isn't where they're handing out the free pregnancy tests.”

“It was just a hug, but gods, it meant so much. It meant everything.”

Rating: 3.5/5.

I really wanted to give it a 4, but it was too similar to “Vampire Academy“ so it just didn’t seem fair. I bet the sequel will get a higher score :)

Reading order:

1. “Half-Blood“
2. "Pure"
3. “Deity“ (November, 6)
4. “Apollyon“ (spring, 2013)
5. “Sentinel“ (fall, 2013)

“Daimon“ (prequel)
 “Elixir“ (Aiden's POV, November, 2012)