Just Finished Reading ... Blue Lily, Lily Blue

Blue Lily, Lily Blue (The Raven Cycle #3)

by Maggie Stiefvater

Published by Scholastic 

on October 21, 2014

Source: eARC from Netgalley

Synopsis from Goodreads: There is danger in dreaming. But there is even more danger in waking up. Blue Sargent has found things. For the first time in her life, she has friends she can trust, a group to which she can belong. The Raven Boys have taken her in as one of their own. Their problems have become hers, and her problems have become theirs. The trick with found things though, is how easily they can be lost.  Friends can betray. Mothers can disappear. Visions can mislead. Certainties can unravel.

My take: Ahhhh. My love for this series cannot be overstated.  Beautiful writing. Complex and realistic characters. A plot that's like a crazy, multi-level puzzle.  These books have everything I love in a book. They make me think and they make me feel. What could be better?

Here's my (spoiler-free) review of Dream Thieves, if you're interested.

And if you're getting ready to read this and need some refreshing on details, be sure to read the Recaptains recap, written by Maggie Stiefvater herself. And hilariously funny.

So... it's hard to review the third book in a multi-book series without spoilers. And this book has not been released worldwide yet, so I want to avoid spoilers at all costs.  So I will speak in generalities.

Each book thus far has seemed to be focused more heavily on one character and, based on the title and cover, I think it will not surprise you if I say that this book focuses a lot on Blue. Fierce, funny, quirky Blue with her multitude of hair clips and her crazy extended family of women with paranormal abilities. But Blue isn't just a Quirky Chick, she also has a lot of depth. I was having a great email chat about the book with two of my favorite blogger friends, Lauren from Love is Not a Triangle and Heather from Flyleaf Review, and we were discussing the fact that in this book, Blue thinks a lot about things she wants but doesn't have and feels she can never have. To say more would be spoilery, but I can say that in this book, Blue is dealing with some family stuff, the result of something that happened in book two. She's having a tough time with that, and also with the fact that she feels like she's stuck on a different life path than the Raven Boys, with their fancy school and their tight friendship. Does she really belong in their group? Yes, of course she does. She has a unique connection to each of the boys, and I love the way that this installment developed -- and complicated --  the friendships between Blue and each one of them.

Much to my dismay as a claustrophobic, some of the action in the story moved to a dark, dank, closed-in sort of place. So I felt like I had to read parts of this with my eyes half-closed. But it was cool when I could get past my sweaty palms and jaw clenching.  There were also new characters. There was Malory, who we've seen as a presence on the phone, and his hilarious dog. Then there was annoying yoga pants-wearing woman and her husband (not a fan of them and I don't think I was supposed to be) and a GUY WHO TALKS LIKE THIS. Huh. Plus there was a heartbreaking revelation about one of my favorite characters. No, not the revelation that if Blue kisses her true love, he will die. We knew that all from page one of the first book :(

I can't wait for the next installment. Will it be Gansey's book? I'm scared if it is.....

If you read this, or can't wait to read it, tell me about it in comments but NO SPOILERS please. You can email me if you want to talk spoilers.