This is the sequel to Storm & Fury and it's a decidedly well-built follow-up. It didn't quite capture me, but it wasn't difficult reading either, so I managed to get through it nice and quick. There weren't any points that felt like a slog and the romance did get turned up to a nice sizzle. Over all, I was quite pleased.
| Date Read: June 28th, 2021  Final Score: 6 / 10 ! | Honestly, there was nothing about it that had any solid development in it for me, other than the Romance and then a small (but admittedly significant plot point). For the most part, this sequel feels like that it is: the middle bit bridging the way between Book 1's intro to the work and Book 3's theoretical conclusion of the story. I think (or at least I hope) that a lot of the lack in the world building aspect of this story comes from the fact that from the author's point of view, it's a spin-off series. I'm guessing (again, more hoping) that a lot of the world building was packed into the main-series and simply left out here because it was considered over-kill. I do no ascribe to that sort of school of thought where world-building is concerned, but I know many people (including editors) who do. All we learned new about the world in this installment was that some angels are more involved with the evolution of Fate than others. Plot wise, a couple of significant discoveries occurred, but nothing that really should have taken a whole book to cover. The real point of this novel was to increase the pressure on the romantic leads, to bring their developing relationship to a tipping point. It was an alright thing to focus on, but not enough to have caught my attention. |
Actually, the constant poor-decision making and the abject refusal to sit-down and talk about things like half-way reasonable humans (which, I can admit, is something teenagers really can't be expected to be) got really annoying. I can understand a few badly-chosen comments and decisions to repress rather than examine (even introspectively, without confessing to the partner they're supposed to be valuing), but it got to be WAY to much after like Badly-Handled Conversation #6...
The inexplicably fierce and fast-rising devotion to each other is explained away by the whole Soul Bond guardian thing, but it's still awkwardly unrealistic in a way I dislike having present in Teen Media. The way these two feel about each other is NOT an example of any sort of half-healthy relationship and that bothers me... But it's not problematic to a truly uncomfortable degree, it was just irksome that this book only focused on the unhealthy relationship without giving me much plot to fixate on while ignoring the over-done romance-y bits.
All in all, it wasn't a great book, but I'm still likely going to pick up the next one in the series in the near-ish future. It's still definitely worth a quick weekend read.
(And again, I do still LOVE the whole Gargoyle concept!)
The inexplicably fierce and fast-rising devotion to each other is explained away by the whole Soul Bond guardian thing, but it's still awkwardly unrealistic in a way I dislike having present in Teen Media. The way these two feel about each other is NOT an example of any sort of half-healthy relationship and that bothers me... But it's not problematic to a truly uncomfortable degree, it was just irksome that this book only focused on the unhealthy relationship without giving me much plot to fixate on while ignoring the over-done romance-y bits.
All in all, it wasn't a great book, but I'm still likely going to pick up the next one in the series in the near-ish future. It's still definitely worth a quick weekend read.
(And again, I do still LOVE the whole Gargoyle concept!)
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