This sequel to the well-imagined Illuminate (2012) falls off slightly but continues the mostly interesting story.
After the fall of the insidious Lexington Hotel, Haven, her boyfriend, Lance, and her friend Dante head off to New Orleans, where they’ll ostensibly become high school volunteers on numerous projects. Recruited and led by Connor, they really join a group of angels-in-training, volunteering by day but strengthening their powers at night. Each of them will face a challenge that may tempt them to abandon their angel status and join the devils. Early on, they encounter a raucous group called the Krewe, which goes on bloody rampages at night. Clearly, these are the devils they’ll have to fight, but Haven has other problems. In the haunted mansion next door, Haven meets Lucian, the devil from the Lexington Hotel who nearly captured her heart and who now needs her help to escape the underworld. Agresti again focuses on Haven’s developing powers and on her relationships, but the battles with the devils that introduced action in the previous book seem less suspenseful this time, as readers see them mostly from afar. This time, although said to be much stronger than before, they emerge only as an occasional threat and so feel less dangerous. The plotline with Lucian stands out as the most interesting part of the story.
Nevertheless, this stands atop the current heap of angel books. (Paranormal suspense. 12 & up)Pub Date: March 5, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-547-62615-4
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2013
Categories: TEEN MYSTERY & THRILLER | TEEN PARANORMAL & SUPERNATURAL | TEEN ROMANCE
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Adolescent criminals seek the haul of a lifetime in a fantasyland at the beginning of its industrial age.
The dangerous city of Ketterdam is governed by the Merchant Council, but in reality, large sectors of the city are given over to gangs who run the gambling dens and brothels. The underworld's rising star is 17-year-old Kaz Brekker, known as Dirtyhands for his brutal amorality. Kaz walks with chronic pain from an old injury, but that doesn't stop him from utterly destroying any rivals. When a councilman offers him an unimaginable reward to rescue a kidnapped foreign chemist—30 million kruge!—Kaz knows just the team he needs to assemble. There's Inej, an itinerant acrobat captured by slavers and sold to a brothel, now a spy for Kaz; the Grisha Nina, with the magical ability to calm and heal; Matthias the zealot, hunter of Grishas and caught in a hopeless spiral of love and vengeance with Nina; Wylan, the privileged boy with an engineer's skills; and Jesper, a sharpshooter who keeps flirting with Wylan. Bardugo broadens the universe she created in the Grisha Trilogy, sending her protagonists around countries that resemble post-Renaissance northern Europe, where technology develops in concert with the magic that's both coveted and despised. It’s a highly successful venture, leaving enough open questions to cause readers to eagerly await Volume 2.
Cracking page-turner with a multiethnic band of misfits with differing sexual orientations who satisfyingly, believably jell into a family . (Fantasy. 14 & up)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-62779-212-7
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015
Categories: TEEN SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | TEEN MYSTERY & THRILLER
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After a family tragedy, 16-year-old Ivy Mason hopes to reconnect with her aloof identical twin sister, Iris—but Iris has other plans.
When Ivy’s parents divorced 10 years ago, Ivy stayed with her father while Iris went to live with their mother. When their mother dies after falling off a bridge while jogging, Iris comes to live with Ivy and their father. Narrator Ivy is reeling (she even goes to therapy), but Iris seems strangely detached, only coming to life when Ivy introduces her to her best friends, Haley and Sophie, and her quarterback boyfriend, Ty. However, Ivy isn’t thrilled when Iris wants to change her class schedule to match hers, and it’s not long before Iris befriends Ivy’s besties and even makes plans with them that don’t include Ivy. Iris even joins the swim team where Ivy is a star swimmer. As Iris’ strange behavior escalates, Ivy starts to suspect that their mother’s death might not have been an accident. Is Iris up to no good, or is Ivy just paranoid? In the end, readers may not care. There are few surprises to be found in a narrative populated by paper-thin characters stuck fast in a derivative plot. Even a jarring final twist can’t save this one. Most characters seem to be white, but there is some diversity in secondary characters.
A lackluster take on a well-worn trope. (Thriller. 13-18)Pub Date: March 3, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-12496-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: Jan. 23, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
Categories: TEEN FICTION | TEEN PARANORMAL & SUPERNATURAL | TEEN MYSTERY & THRILLER
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