Silver Shadows Review.

Book: Silver Shadows.

Written By: Richelle Mead.

Pages: 380.

Synopsis: Now in the aftermath of an event that ripped their world apart, Sydney and Adrian struggle to pick up the pieces and find their way back to each other. But first, they have to survive.

For Sydney, trapped and surrounded by adversaries, life becomes a daily struggle to hold on to her identity and the memories of those she loves. Meanwhile, Adrian clings to hope in the face of those who tell him Sydney is a lost cause, but the battle proves daunting as old demons and new temptations begin to seize hold of him. . . .

Their worst fears now a chilling reality, Sydney and Adrian face their darkest hour in this heart-pounding fifth installment in the New York Times bestselling Bloodlines series, where all bets are off.

My Thoughts: Now this was a wild ride.

From the first moment re-education was mentioned in Book 1, I knew that it was a place that we would eventually visit and I knew it was going to be a hellhole… and it didn’t disappoint. Re-education is no joke… and Sydney does not play around either for that matter. The Alchemists literally pulled out all of the stops with her and she just would not give in! Part of me wanted to give her a high five for fighting the system and staying in solitary for solid three months just so they would not have the satisfaction of breaking her, but another part of me just couldn’t help but to think about how stupid that was. Like, girl… The best way to beat them at their own game is to make them think they are winning… Why did it take her 3 months to figure that out? But when she did, she was unstoppable and it was awe inspiring and I was glad to see her fire return after her turning into a co-dependent ball of mush.

Of course, Adrian was the downside to this all. He is such a cry baby I can’t even. He loves to talk more than he likes to take action (unless of course taking action means putting yourself in places you are not suppose to be, or literally making every situation worse. In that case, he LOVES to take action). Like dude, do you think that the only way to help Sydney is to find her in her dreams (you would think after the whole Sonya debacle her would have assumed to would have been too drugged up for him to reach…but this is Adrian we are talking about) or call her dad (come on you didn’t think that would work did you?) Of course when none of that worked he ran away with his tail between his legs back to court.

One thing that pissed me off to no end was how he took advantage of Lissa’s friendship and of her title. He thinks that just because they are friends and she is queen, that it is her duty to do everything that he needs, despite what that may mean for the Moroi race as a whole. Yes, I wish Lissa could have helped more, but everything she was saying was right! She has absolutely NO jurisdiction over the Alchemist and what they do with their people no matter how much she disagrees with them. And of course, when Adrian doesn’t get his way, what does he do? He throws a tantrum and acts like a big ass baby. Instead of trying to be useful and figure out how to get the so called love of his life back, he spends weeks getting drunk and acting like a total jackass.

What I find interesting is that the readers are lead to believe that Adrian saved the day and heroically rescued his damsel, Sydney ,from the big bad Alchemist when, if you really look at it, Marcus saved the day. Well, of course, Adrian did play a hand in it, but the real superstar here was Marcus. It was Sydney’s idea to find Keith and Marcus was the one who devised that plan. HE was the one who knew the Carly was and if they had not found Carly, they would have never gotten the info they needed to find the re-education center… The re-education center that MARCUS found by the way. It was also Marcus’s friends (okay so Adrian, Trey and Eddie were there too) who lit that place up and saved all of those people. Let’s face it, Marcus is smart, clever and fearless and without him, springing Sydney would have been impossible. Now I am wishing for that love triangle that never happened. #TEAMMARCUS #EVENTHOUGHHEHASTHATSTUPIDINDIGOSHITONHISFACE #STUPIDHAIRDONTCARE

The wedding was so extra I could not. It was ridiculous. Yes, it was sweet that he really wanted to give her a real wedding an a memorable day, and at the time I thought it was romantic. Looking back, it was a horrible idea. It was completely unnecessary for the story and I felt like it was just a way to flesh out the book. Once again, I felt like I was reading Twilight. Everything that they went through to make the wedding happen reminded me of a bad comedy sketch. The icing on the cake was the scene on the helicopter pad… again, it was just extra. It was so cheesy and so cliche that I am cringing now as I type this… and now I am laughing. What was the point of all that? Really? This whole book had SO much going on that this just took it over the edge of ridiculousness.

One scene I did love though, was when everyone met up in the queen’s chambers. Of course, I wanted to punch Adrian in his cocky childish mouth, but I love how the Alchemists and Nate Ivashkov were SEETHING. They were so mad! It was hilarious. (Also, Ian was a straight ass pervert. I mean at least Sydney was around his age and mature, but Zoe? Really? She is a child!) Of course Lissa proved what an amazing friend she was, she helped Adrian and basically made an enemy out of the Alchemist (which are a necessary ally to have whether we like it or not) all because she wanted to help Adrian and Sydney and of course, Adrian can’t even be bothered with a simple “Thank You.” I seriously cannot believe that this is the same guy we met in Frostbite. Yes, there are some good changes, but most of his changes are for the worst.

I’ll admit that Silver Shadows was beyond entertaining and I could not stop reading. There were so many thing going on that I didn’t even want to blink for fear of missing it. Even though I really didn’t care for most the stuff that happened, I can appreciate that it always kept me interested and I always wanted more… But I have to say that I am not sure if that was because I was so invested or if it was because I could not wait to get it over with. At the end of the day, I gave it 4 Stars because in comparison to the rest of this awful series, it was the best book so far and sadly I don’t think that it can get any better.
⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

P.S. Shout out to my favorite Dhampirs Rose and Dimitri for having Sydney’s back.