When I first heard this book was coming out I expected to have a fun trip down memory lane. Instead I found myself struggling to connect to this book. It is very repetitive with how it keeps explaining who these characters are and what is going on. It made it extremely hard to connect to the characters. Honestly this is not worth the read

Melissa de la Cruz's Blue Bloods series has always been one of my favorites! I was excited to see this new story about some of my favorite characters. Even though it has been several years since I read the series, I happily began reading Blue Bloods: After Life. To my dismay, the setting of the story was NOT appealing; I was crushed. I kept on reading hoping to stir those old feelings about the characters I fell in love with so long ago. It didn't go well. The multiple POVs helped getting to know the characters in this setting, but it just felt like a retelling of the original story. I would have liked to see more of the characters how they were at the end of the series and growing from there. Although I felt I understood the thoughts behind some of the ideas in this installment of Blue Bloods, this story fell short for me, and I was disappointed.
Thank you to Disney Publishing Worldwide for this advanced review copy which I voluntarily read and reviewed. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

One cannot review Melissa de la Cruz’s latest entry to the Blue Blood’s series without addressing the fact that it will probably draw a few heckling comments from fan purists, both young and old.

Afterlife is essentially a loose retelling of the original series. The tale toys with the idea of parallel universes, allowing the setting to be fast-forwarded to an alternate version of our present day, with a more diverse cast of characters. While Jack is still Jack in this parallel world and Kingsley is still Kingsley; Schuyler is mixed race, Oliver is Asian, and Mimi is now Max. Only Kingsley and Schuyler really remember their former selves in that other world.

Readers familiar with the older series may balk at the changes; however de la Cruz has really streamlined this tale, focusing on action and mystery rather than the superfluous high school drama, shopping sprees, parties, and jet setting journeys abroad. With the action taking place in New York, there’s enough there to capture a reader’s interest. The writing is fast-paced, visual, and surprisingly fun. For what is essentially a Blue Bloods redox, it’s rather well done. Melissa de la Cruz’s style has matured to a more focused and driven method of storytelling. It works. Can’t wait for the next installment.

Thank you to the publisher & NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review the novel. I am rating this book with my own opinion and have not received anything in return.

#netgalleyarc I started reading this book as a sort of obligation as I’ve read all the ones before it, and it didn’t go I to it with high hopes, but I enjoyed it and would read others if this series continues. This book has a Marvel/multiverse feel and a parallel to the Covid 19 pandemic, things that shouldn’t work together but some how do. The original series went on for awhile and became very derivative but this new addition makes it feel fresh.

I cannot overstate how disappointed I was by this book. I love Melissa de la Cruz! I’ve read a lot of her books, and enjoyed them! I particularly loved the Blue Bloods series, which was contemporaneous with a lot of supernatural romance emerging in YA. Schuyler is a compelling protagonist, and her adventures moved quickly from peril to peril, before ultimately she and her friends triumph over their devilish adversaries. This victory doesn’t come without loss, as Schuyler is forced to sacrifice her true love in order to defeat Lucifer.

Blue Bloods: After Life takes place in a totally different world, with the Schuyler we know suddenly inhabiting the life of a different Schuyler, in a different year, in a vastly different New York. The premise is promising, and then it’s completely unfulfilled.

First issue: world-building. This story takes place in pandemic-era New York, in 2020, and Schuyler is fifteen, in high school again. Some things are very different, she and Oliver have different last names and families, and some things are weirdly the same: Schuyler has the same father, for one thing. And she’s still a Blue Blood, despite not being Gabrielle’s daughter in this universe. What? That’s explained away pretty quickly, but not to my satisfaction. There are also some differences in the history of this world, but that doesn’t seem to affect the present day much? Like, Napoleon died a lot earlier, but that doesn’t change the modern world in a discernible way. The whole alternate worlds thing requires more panache to pull off and it just doesn’t happen in this book.

Kingsley Martin is also in this universe, but he arrived a year earlier, for some reason, and is running the underground resistance. Another thing that just happens! Why would Kingsley just fall out of the sky? No explanation. I will say just about the only compelling thing about this book was his chemistry with Max Force, and their relationship developing. Then, killing Kingsley off? Ugh, why? He’s already died once in this series, how much does he have to take?

I think if I was doctoring this book, it wouldn’t take much to fix the biggest problems. Firstly, the point of views were a great idea, I love seeing into Max’s head, so a good change would be that it’s only Jack who gets thrown into the body of his alternate self. He’s just died in the main Blue Bloods universe, I’d buy it that he would somehow bleed between the worlds or be thrust into another version of himself. Plus, let’s face it, Schuyler’s life in this alternate world is boring, she has little power and even less information. I did not want to read about her being in Zoom classes all day and then sneaking out at night. So, cut that Kingsley and Schuyler fall through, and just have it be Jack. He has this weird imposition of his old self, the one we know, and he becomes conflicted about his position as Lucifer’s golden boy. Meanwhile, you can still have Kingsley and Max fall in love, just the version of Kingsley from this universe, who can still be sabotaging Lucifer. Jack can fall in love with this universe’s Schuyler, and find the strength to turn against the devil. I also don’t like that this is setting up at least a sequel, and possibly a new series. I would just have this be a stand-alone book, and have Jack and Max work together with Schuyler to defeat Lucifer from the inside. Given their positions in his organization, it wouldn’t be that hard to get close to Lucifer and for Schuyler to shish-kebab him. These changes would weed out a lot of what doesn’t work about this book, and lean on the strengths: Max and Kingsley’s relationship, and that between the twins. I think this book actually did build a good bond between Max and Jack, and I think having the book from their perspectives alone would allow that relationship to take center stage in the development of the characters.

The primary thought I had while reading this book was that the author wanted to change some things about the way they told they story, without sacrificing the narrative already existing. It just was a frustrating, boring story with little to recommend it. You’re better off just rereading the original series.

Welcome back to the world of Blue Bloods! It was great reading about Schuyler and Jack again, how I have missed them! Book 8 in the series.