It has been a while since I read The Mockingbirds, but I got quickly up to speed in The Rivals. The students seem a little older in this series, so much so that I thought they were in college. Though they seem grown up, they make some bad decisions, which is where the Mockingbirds come in. The latest case is a tricky one for the vigilante group due to the relationship of the accused to members of the Mockingbirds, and that this time the victim is the entire student body. The Mockingbirds go on a wild goose chase to find the real culprit behind the cheating ring.

There are some growing pains for the Mockingbirds as they get used to their new group dynamic and their evolving role in the school. I think it makes sense that the group would be under scrutiny, when you have a small court making decisions for the whole school. Their role is interesting to me and I like that they have taken the responsibility of making student offenders accountable when the faculty is not doing their job. It did seem like too much for the students to take on though – I wouldn’t want my child to go to a school that doesn’t protect them.

Solving the crime is part of the fun in The Rivals. Every time I thought I had it figured out, there would be something new to shed doubt on another character. New as well as familiar characters at Themis Academy are under the microscope in the latest scandal. Alex has to make hard choices in her leadership role with all the conflicting evidence. She has grown a lot as a character even though she is realistically still dealing with the after effects of the date rape, and everything doesn’t go perfectly for her in her first case.

I like how Daisy Whitney incorporates the arts into the series through the characters interest in literature, music, dance and drama. The new characters fit in well, as there are new villains and allies in Alex’s world. In addition to the Mockingbirds and Alex’s road to Julliard, the romance story also heats up. And the introduction of a potential rival for Alex’s affections also caught my interest.

I liked the way this book got me excited to read more about these characters. In a way, both books in the series work well as standalone’s but The Rivals takes the drama to the next level and heightened my interest in the series. I don’t know if there is a third book but there are a few juicy storylines that I’m interested to see how they play out. If you like older YA books with ethical dilemmas or just enjoy a good mystery, give this series a try. ( )

Sequel to Mockingbirds. Alex struggles to balance her role as the new head of the Mockingbirds with her boyfriend and friendships as she tries to discover who's behind a drug ring. ( )

Review & Author Interview for Day 01 of my Spring Break Blog Spectacular :)

(review contains spoilers for The Mockingbirds [#1])

When, the during her junior year at Themis Academy an elite boarding school, Alex Patrick accused another student of date rape, the school - the administration - wouldn't do anything about it. It fell to the Mockingbirds, the school's semi-secret policing body to do something about it.

Now, Alex is head of the group that helps protect Themis' student body and hoping she can live up to all of the expectations that come with the title.

But Alex's first case isn't rape and it isn't bullying. It isn't anything the Mockingbirds have dealt with before.

A cheating ring has popped up over the summer. Students are using prescription meds to cheat. How do the Mockingbirds deal with this new sort of crime, one that has no clear victim?

When things begin about the case being not to add up quite right, Alex risks putting her relationships - with her boyfriend, Martin; with her best friends - in danger all in the interest of unraveling the mystery.

I admittedly can't remember The Mockingbirds closely enough to compare The Rivals to it point by point - or anywhere near that - but I can remember it enough to know that I loved it.

I had wondered what sort of a 'crime' would be at the center of this book - or if one would be. The Mockingbirds didn't really have a plot you could repeat. The Rivals has a very different type of crime for the Mockingbirds to investigate and charge someone with but it doesn't make the book any less good to read. We actually get to learn more about more of the characters as they're all working on things this time

Things are kept incredibly realistic with Alex, the main character. She didn't magically forget all about her assault during the summer. Now back at school, we see the new things that affect her, seeing Carter with a girl, among them.

One of my favorite things with book sequels - what I think makes for a good, if not extraordinary sequel - is when the events of the previous book aren't forgotten in exchange for this new book and its goings on. Rather, I love when in the second (or third, fourth, etc) book, things from the previous book(s) are brought in and their effect on the characters and/or their surroundings are made to use the story feel whole and real. The Rivals, and Daisy Whitney, of course, do this magnificently.

Daisy Whitney has published another great contemporary YA book with brilliant characters - and quite a mystery, too.

Rating: 9/10

(book received from LBYR for review, thank you) ( )

After reading The Mockingbirds, I was excited to pick up The Rivals. While The Mockingbirds could have ended where it did, I loved the characters and story, and I was a very happy reader with book two sitting next to me, especially with how different it proved to be from book one. (While I enjoyed book one, it would be boring to read the same formula in a different setting with a new case.) The Mockingbirds dealt with date rape. In book two, some students are using prescription drugs to cheat; plus, the Mockingbirds find rivals in another student group of vigilantes.

While the story picks up where book one left off, book two is different in that there is more intrigue: there is a case, but we don't know who is at fault and must figure it out along with the characters, who show some amazing development once again. Alex struggles with leading the Mockingbirds. While the idea of a student vigilante group sounds amazing, it is hard to maintain. Alex doesn't have a clear set of moral guidelines to follow, and she doesn't know when to be a friend, a student, or the head of a student vigilante group.

At the same time, Alex is still suffering from the same experiences that haunted her during book one, and her experiences prove an obstacle to forming new relationships. She and the other main characters' ethics are tested; they fail, they admit their mistakes, and they grow. I loved them the better for their human weaknesses. The culprits, on the other hand, are characters that you love to hate.

While there is not as much action as book one, The Rivals also confronts ethical issues that makes us consider what we would do in the characters' situations, and it is a great followup to The Mockingbirds. Whether or not you've read book one, The Rivals is a book that I would definitely recommend; and if you haven't read book one already, I highly suggest you get your hands on a copy! ( )

I loved The Mockingbirds and at the end of that book, I was excited to see where the sequel would lead since I really liked the characters, but I almost felt like the story was over. So, I had my worries that this installment would not live up to the first, that it would just be unneeded. I'm happy to report that my worries were completely unwarranted.

The Rivals leads the reader down many false paths and scary revelations as the characters struggle to find themselves, protect others, and to ultimately do the right thing - they just have to figure out what that is first... In the first novel the characters were playing by the rules, fighting for justice. Now with the same motive in mind, it's time to break some of those rules. The ends justify the means, right? Right?

What is different about this novel, in contrast to the first, is that there is more mystery and suspicion. In The Mockingbirds, the reader knows what went down (for the most part) at the beginning of the novel. In The Rivals, the reader is trying to figure out who is really at fault at the same time as the characters are. The case is there, but the details are not revealed on the first page. I really enjoyed that about this novel; how it was a continuation of the same characters and setting, but the way the story was told was different enough to be unique to itself (meaning separate from it's beginning).

Not to completely cover everything I just said, but I also appreciated how there were linking themes throughout. Alex was hurt. She was tainted with something that would never leave her, and not to say that I liked her suffering, but I appreciated how it didn't just disappear once she became involved with the Mockingbirds (or a certain boy). She is still struggling to find herself, to separate good relationships from that terrible experience. To make matters worse, she has huge new responsibilities and she doesn't know where her responsibilities as Head of the Mockingbirds should end and her responsibilities as a friend, as a student, as herself should take over.

Need I say it? (Yet I will... because this is how these types of things go...) Read it! ( )