Pay Attention Carter Jones

Pay Attention Carter Jones by Gary D. Schmidt

I've previously read Orbiting Jupiter also by Gary D. Schmidt, I liked it a lot, but just didn't review it here. So here's the Amazon Link in case you're interested. It's pretty good, but also kind of sad. Good sad.

Anywho. This book was published on February 5, 2019, but I read the advanced reader's copy. Undoubtedly, there will be some differences between the version I read and the published edition.

An amazon summary, "Carter Jones is astonished early one morning when he finds a real English butler, bowler hat and all, on the doorstep—one who stays to help the Jones family, which is a little bit broken.

In addition to figuring out middle school, Carter has to adjust to the unwelcome presence of this new know-it-all adult in his life and navigate the butler's notions of decorum. And ultimately, when his burden of grief and anger from the past can no longer be ignored, Carter learns that a burden becomes lighter when it is shared.Sparkling with humor, this insightful and compassionate story will resonate with readers who have confronted secrets of their own." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

On the first day of school, the Jones house is in a mild state of chaos. Carter is trying to help his mother while she puts braids in his younger sister's hair, another sister can't find her favorite yellow socks, and the other sister is trying to make cereal but the milk is spoiled. A knock sounds on the front door, and Carter answers it only to find a gentleman standing there in a suit. He basically closes the door on him, tells his mother, but the knock sounds again. So Carter's mother tells him to basically make him go away. Carter re-approaches the gentleman, explains the current chaos, but curiously, the butler tells him to go pack his backpack for school. Carter is understandably skeptical, but does as he says.

The gentleman returns with milk, new socks, and ferries the family to school in the "eggplant car" (he drives a very purple car). Come to find out, their grandfather has passed away, and this gentleman's family has been in service to his grandfather for a long time, and even thought his father is away in service in Germany, the gentleman has come to help the family. ...he's basically a butler.

Also, there's cricket involved.

That's enough summary.

I loved this book so much. The butler enters their lives and slowly makes it better. He does little things that kind of gives them routine and helps them so much...even in the midst of their grief.

I described this book to one of my friends, and they asked if it was basically Mary Poppins. I'm going to say no, not just because there's no song and dance and all that jazz, but there is cricket... BUT, also because the lessons taught throughout the book are done in such a different way.

Also, I won't ever pretend to be interested in sports, or understand them, or anything. I'm just incompatible with sports. So, when cricket came up, the book did a great job of explaining all of it, and all the teamwork that happened was great because you know sports, teamwork stuff. I think it did help the story, and definitely didn't detract from it at all.

It was a great, great story.

The whole family is really charming, and a dachshund pet who throws up whenever it's excited is also, somehow charming.

Happy reading!

Song of the Abyss

Song of the Abyss by Makiia Lucier

This book will be published on August 27, 2019. I read an advance reading copy and undoubtedly there will be differences between the version I read, and the published version.

This is book 2 in the Tower of Winds series. I reviewed the first book, Isle of Blood and Stone, HERE. I really liked the first book, and I think you would get more out of book 2 if you read book 1, but I kind of think you can read book 2 without reading book 1. Just accept the world as it is.....but really, read book 1 because it's also amazing.

An amazon summary, "They came in the night as she dreamt, in her berth, on a ship sailing home to del Mar. After, they would be all Reyna thought about: two carracks painted scorpion black. No emblem on either forecastle, no pennants flying above the mainmasts to hint at a kingdom of origin.

     Never a good sign.   
     As the granddaughter of a famed navigator, seventeen-year-old Reyna has always lived life on her own terms, despite those who say a girl could never be an explorer for the royal house of St. John del Mar. She is determined to prove them wrong, and as she returns home after a year-long expedition, she knows her dream is within reach. No longer an apprentice, instead: Reyna, Master Explorer.
     But when menacing raiders attack her ship, those dreams are pushed aside. Reyna's escape is both desperate and dangerous, and when next she sees her ship, a mystery rises from the deep. The sailors--her captain, her countrymen--have vanished. To find them, Reyna must use every resource at her disposal . . . including placing her trust in a handsome prince from a rival kingdom.
     Together they uncover a disturbing truth. The attack was no isolated incident. Troubling signs point to a shadowy kingdom in the north, and for once, the rulers of the Sea of Magdalen agree: something must be done. But can Reyna be brave enough to find a way?" AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

I would guesstimate this book roughly take place maybe 10 years or so (give or take a few due to my memory and math skills) after the first book. Reyna has grown up with aspirations of being an explorer for the kingdom of del Mar. She's returning from a yearlong voyage, when she's woken in the middle of the night by her bodyguard who says the ship is being commandeered. They quickly destroy all maps that would reveal del Mar's trade routes to the attackers. However, the bodyguard mentions the crew seemed to shuffle by without resisting the attackers, almost as if they were blank. The bodyguard cannot swim and escape with Reyna, so they end up shoving Reyna out of the window and into the treacherous sea below. The serpents might kill her before she reaches shore.

That's literally, just the first fifteen pages of the story. I was CAPTIVATED (pun intended, HAR). Everything from there starts an adventure of Reyna going home (and accidentally bumping into a prince of the neighboring kingdom after her escape), to trying to find out what happened to the ship she was on and the crew.

Literally, this is another one of those books where the less said, the better because there is so much intricate story telling that I don't want to lure readers off from the complete experience.

That being said, I LOVED Reyna. She's freaking awesome and everything I hope to find other female lead characters being. She has a great sense of self, determination, cleverness, and strength. It's just refreshing to read someone that also feels authentic. Good, this is good, good, stuff.

The world building was also on point, phenomenal. The first book did a wonderful job, and the second book only added more. The lore of the world simultaneously enhances the story and also gives the world a sense of being it's own character almost. It kind of reminded of the Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater (which I reviewed HERE), but in that story, the island also took on it's own personality of sorts. The island became a character in a sense. I would say the world of this book almost becomes a character in a sense because of all the different wonders it holds. ...am I being vague enough? Hmmmm.... 

I also enjoyed so much of the relationships between all the characters. I do kind of wish we got to see a little more of del Mar, but only because I loved reading so much about del Mar in the first book. There were a few scenes on del Mar, and they were pretty great, but again, I mostly just wanted to see del Mar because of book 1. Book 2 did a very lovely job with it's various different parts of the world, but sometimes I just want to see ...home... I guess. Yeah I know, whatever. I'm a tough customer.

The story itself also had a lot of mystery elements to it, which was pretty excellent to see how all of it revealed in the end.

Would highly recommend. I stayed up late one night just to finish this book. It's that caliber of good.

Happy reading!

Lady Smoke

Lady Smoke by Laura Sebastian

This is the sequel to ASH PRINCESS. If you don't want anything spoiled about book 1, I would highly recommend skipping this review.

An amazon summary to ponder your choices, but also without all the praise and hype from book 1 because I don't want three pages of amazon summary, kthxbai, "The Kaiser murdered Theodosia's mother, the Fire Queen, when Theo was only six. He took Theo's country and kept her prisoner, crowning her Ash Princess--a pet to toy with and humiliate for ten long years. That era has ended. The Kaiser thought his prisoner weak and defenseless. He didn't realize that a sharp mind is the deadliest weapon.

Theo no longer wears a crown of ashes. She has taken back her rightful title, and a hostage--Prinz Soren. But her people remain enslaved under the Kaiser's rule, and now she is thousands of miles away from them and her throne.
To get them back, she will need an army. Only, securing an army means she must trust her aunt, the dreaded pirate Dragonsbane. And according to Dragonsbane, an army can only be produced if Theo takes a husband. Something an Astrean Queen has never done.
Theo knows that freedom comes at a price, but she is determined to find a way to save her country without losing herself." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

To very briefly recap book 1; after 10 years of brutal torture and humiliation at the hands of the Kaiser, the man who murdered her mother, who forced her to kill her father, and who was really just a misery of a man; Theo managed to reconnect with one of her childhood friends, hatches a plan to escape, and manages to escape with the help of Prinz Soren...who she ends up kidnapping. The briefest recap everrrrrr. There's a lot of good stuff in book one, I would recommend reading it.

Theo needs to reclaim her throne. Oh, also at the end of book one she meets up with the mysterious pirate Dragonsbane who turns out to be her mother's twin, and therefore her aunt. ...pretty random and cool right? Not a convenient plot device at all. Shh, it's fine.

Theo needs to reclaim her throne. With the help of Dragonsbane, she begrudgingly agrees to meet suitors in a kingdom where they'll be safe from Kaiser, for now. She suspects Dragonsbane has an agreement with the kingdom, but she has yet to figure out what it may be. Her trio of guardians become her most trusted counsel, but, Theo still can't shake her feelings for Prinz Soren, confusing as they may be. While on Dragonsbane ship, Prinz Soren has been locked up. Theo insists on seeing him, and hates the way he's being treated, and through several manipulations and mishaps, Prinz Soren is able to travel with them rather than as a prisoner.

However, Theo is opposed to being married since her kingdom, which should really be referred to as a queendom, has always been ruled by queens (hence queendom).

...and I'm just going to stop summarizing there.

This book was basically Theo's rude awakening to how the world works outside of the Kaiser's prison, but also, how the Kaiser inadvertently trained her kind of, to navigate tense or aggravated situations at all times.

That being said, Theo tried to champion for herself a lot during the book, but it didn't seem believable since she also relied so heavily on her guardians to do so much for her. It's not that she was constantly being rescued, it was more like she'd lead all of them directly to the danger, and then kind of let someone else take over as she ambled around in the mostly background?

I think the author intended for Theo to be a strong, feminist character, RAHHHHH which would have been really cool. I just don't think Theo comes across like that. For one, Theo has too much going on to really engage in the various situations she's thrown in. For two, Theo is kind of a flat character; besides mad or uncertain, I don't think she really conveyed any other emotions during the book.

Plus, the side characters really felt diminished to only their abilities or how Theo could maneuver them to get what she needed out of a situation. It was kind of disheartening. I was hoping that out of the palace we would get to see more of everyone else... but we did get to see a little more of Dragonsbane's daughter, Artemesia, but again, she seemed to be reduced to the role of Dragonsbane's daughter, plus wield water, plus fight well. Granted, we saw her personality more so than anyone else's... because somehow Prinz Soren was reduced to entirely uninteresting and being shuffled around in ways that made him a liability more than anything because then Theo would have to manipulate everyone else into rescuing him again.

...this book was a bit maddening, but now I'm invested, so I'm going to read book 3.

I did overall, enjoy the book (I say with lots of hesitation) but the closer I look at it, the more flaws that become apparent. It's kind of one of those. Yeah.

Happy reading!

Prosper Redding: The Last Life of Prince Alastor

Prosper Redding: The Last Life of Prince Alastor by Alexandra Bracken

This is the sequel to THE DREADFUL TALE OF PROSPER REDDING and if you don't want any of that spoiled, just don't read this review. Two thumbs up or something.

...an amazon summary! "Three hundred years ago, fate bound Prosper Redding and Prince Alastor of the Third Realm together. Now the human boy and fiend heir to the demon kingdom must put aside a centuries-old blood feud to save everything they love.

Alastor will guide Prosper through the demon realm-under one huge condition: Prosper must enter into a contract with the malefactor residing in him, promising eternal servitude in the afterlife. With Prosper's sister in the clutches of the evil queen Pyra, Prosper has no choice but to agree.
But when they arrive in Alastor's deliciously demonic home, the realm is almost as alien to Alastor as it is to Prosper-the lowest fiends have dethroned the ruling malefactors, while an unfathomable force called the Void is swiftly consuming the realm. The desperate fiends cling to the one person who says she can stop it: Pyra.
As Prosper embarks on a perilous rescue mission to the Tower of No Return, he can't help but feel for the demons losing their home-even Alastor, who lives by a set of rules that have vanished in a new world.
With the fates of humans and demons at odds, the battle lines are drawn. Long ago, Prosper's ancestor Honor Redding proved that humans and demons could never be friends. But is Prosper like his ancestor? And is Alastor the same demon who was betrayed by the one human he cared for?" AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

The end of the last book was prettttttttttty intense, but then this book picks up literally where the last one left off, so off into the fiend realm first, hilarious thing. They enter through Alastor's hidden mirror...which is in a toilet. Anyways, they've teamed up through a contract to go rescue Prosper's sister. However, as they enter the fiend realm, it turns out it's not quite how Alastor remembers.

There's the Void after all.

The Void is consuming the fiend realm, and not only are they racing against Alastor's sister to save Prosper's sister, they're racing against the actual Void consuming the fiend realm. It's a tough bit.

Also, Nell manages to get into the fiend realm, but she came a bit better prepared than Alastor was, so she actually has like food and water with her. You know, reasonable things to survive with. So, without Nell, Alastor was going to be a little stuck.

But, that's enough summary.

I liked this book, but I wanted more from Alastor. This felt a lot more of just Prosper's voice in this book, and I loved the back and forth between Alastor and Prosper was one of my favorite aspects about the last book.

However, seeing more of Alastor's history was marvelous. I loved learning more about the original pact that Alastor had with Prosper's ancestor and how all of it came to be.

I did also love the story behind how the realms came to be, and how much we did get to see of the fiend realm.... but I wanted to see more of the realm. There was kind of this subplot that they got caught up in, and I understand why it happened, but I wanted to stick with the main story.

I really liked how the book ended, but I'm also confused if there's going to be more in the series. It could stop right there and it would, literally be fine. I would be content. If there's a sequel in the works, then I would hesitate about what content it would be about. I don't want to say any more because no spoilers.

Curious thoughts for a hopeful book ending.

Happy reading!

Blanca & Roja

Blanca & Roja by Anna-Marie McLemore

Big sighs folks. Big sighs. 

I'm just going to, here's the amazon summary, "The biggest lie of all is the story you think you already know.

The del Cisne girls have never just been sisters; they’re also rivals, Blanca as obedient and graceful as Roja is vicious and manipulative. They know that, because of a generations-old spell, their family is bound to a bevy of swans deep in the woods. They know that, one day, the swans will pull them into a dangerous game that will leave one of them a girl, and trap the other in the body of a swan.

But when two local boys become drawn into the game, the swans’ spell intertwines with the strange and unpredictable magic lacing the woods, and all four of their fates depend on facing truths that could either save or destroy them. Blanca & Roja is the captivating story of sisters, friendship, love, hatred, and the price we pay to protect our hearts." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

This is kind of the retelling of snow white and red rose, but it's also a new twist on the story involving swans.

This seems like a great story right, something that should latch onto my attention and hold it, hold it tight. ...but I only made it halfway through the book. Kind of unrelated, but the story is told from four different narrators. I like to know that before getting into a book, so I like to give a heads up to other readers as well.

Alright, so Blanca and Roja are del Cisne girls; one of whom is destined to be taken away by the swans after they're both 15 years old. Blanca and Roja are best friends and their relationship goes deep. They do everything in their power to make themselves seem like the same person to confuse the swans. ...but eventually the swans come for them.

Two boys have gone missing, and have been taken in by the woods (they're the other two narrators). One of them has a very fascinating description about becoming different aspects or beings in the woods. They find their way to the del Cisne girls separately.

Alright, that's enough summary.

I think my biggest hold up with the book is the writing style. A lot of it was interesting ideas and concepts, but I started to really hate how the sisters were portrayed. It was a big thing for them to be like WE'RE SO CLOSE, to the swans showing up, and then it basically all going to hell. Secret plans, strong bonds, and it was a little bit of whip lash.  The boys also come with their own secrets, which is fine, but I hated everything being teased at, hinted at, and there was no reveal. I know, if I finished the book, I probably would have found out. I probably would have learned what happened with the swans too, but also, I don't like that kind of suspense. I don't like it when the author  doesn't even give us clues as to what the secret is besides that they don't want to reveal it. It's kind of like watching a character in a tv series just brood on screen for a while without knowing why. Eventually you just get bored and annoyed with it.

I did really want to like the book, especially since it's a more modern fairy tale with a twist usually found in older fairy tales. I just couldn't get through it, the attitudes of the different characters were too grating, and without any one character to really root for (though I was very partial to Roja), I still couldn't muster enough to get through it.

If you read it, let me know how it ends. I'm still curious about how it all wraps up...just not enough to stomach all the brooding.

Happy reading!

King of Scars

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo

It is no secret that I'm a HUGE Leigh Bardugo fan. I previously reviewed her first three books, SHADOW AND BONE, SIEGE AND STORM, and RUIN AND RISING. However, she's also written Six of Crows, Crooked Kingdom, and The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic. I may review them at some point, but I've definitely read and LOVED them.

However, you definitely need to read the trilogy Shadow and Bone, Siege and Storm, and Ruin and Rising plus the duology Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom before reading this book, King of Scars. It may seem like a lot of work, but the Grisha universe is pretty intricate, and a lot of characters in King of Scars are from previous books. It does include some backstory for different characters, but you definitely don't get the full flavor of the character without reading the previous books. ...which is probably a weird way to phrase it, but... I don't care. FIGHT ME.

An amazon summary, "The Grishaverse will be coming to Netflix soon with Shadow and Bone, an original series!

Face your demons...or feed them.

Nikolai Lantsov has always had a gift for the impossible. No one knows what he endured in his country’s bloody civil war―and he intends to keep it that way. Now, as enemies gather at his weakened borders, the young king must find a way to refill Ravka’s coffers, forge new alliances, and stop a rising threat to the once-great Grisha Army.

Yet with every day a dark magic within him grows stronger, threatening to destroy all he has built. With the help of a young monk and a legendary Grisha Squaller, Nikolai will journey to the places in Ravka where the deepest magic survives to vanquish the terrible legacy inside him. He will risk everything to save his country and himself. But some secrets aren’t meant to stay buried―and some wounds aren’t meant to heal.

Enter the Grishaverse with King of Scars, from #1 New York Times-bestselling author Leigh Bardugo." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

So, in the amazon summary it indicates that the first trilogy will soon be on Netflix as an original series. ....I just hope they get it right. Enough said.

Nikolai has been running the country of Ravka after the events of the previous books, and he's doing a pretty decent job.... but he's also turning into a monster in the middle of the night randomly for no apparent reason.

His general, Zoya, is steadfastly by his side, determined to see Ravka do well once more. Zoya is also pretty powerful, takes her position seriously, and doesn't take any crap from anyone. She is admired for beauty, but feared for temperament and power.
Nina works for Nikolai by going under cover in different parts of the world to rescue Grisha. Nina's powers are still altered (see previous books) and she's also been taking Mathias around with her to try to find a proper place to bury him... and also find the strength to finally say goodbye.

That's enough summary since a lot of this story is told through the rich history woven throughout all the books. They're so good.

Anywho.

I really liked this book. I thought each narrator had a unique enough voice that I didn't have to read the chapter title to know who they were. I kind of wished we were given a consistent fourth voice from somewhere else in the world to give us a more balanced view of the state of Ravka. We only got to see it from people who are wildly loyal to Ravka. I think it would have been beneficial to see what was going on from someone who was trying to thwart Ravka and why. ...I know, I know, I can't have it all, but I can at least express what I want. ...I digress.

It's still the same great storytelling as the previous books, with a refreshing reminder about key pieces of information for the lore that...even if you read the books when they first came out...and it may have been a while since reading the original trilogy, you won't be lost. *weak cough*

But yeah. Would highly recommend. Leigh Bardugo's books are also ones I frequently recommend to people.

Happy reading!

The Devouring Gray

The Devouring Gray by Christine Lynn Herman

This book will be published on April 2, 2019. I read the advance reader's copy, and undoubtedly there will be differences between the version I read and the published version.

Alright, so long story short, I saw an advertisement for this book that was like, For Fans of Riverdale and I was like, "HMMMM" because I watch Riverdale... and then I thought it was kind of strange that a book was advertised to be similar to a TV show. So, I got my hands on a copy. I can see why they tried to relate it to Riverdale, but I think there are other shows it more closely resembles. I digress.

An amazon summary, "After the death of her sister, seventeen-year-old Violet Saunders finds herself dragged to Four Paths, New York. Violet may be a newcomer, but she soon learns her mother isn't: They belong to one of the revered founding families of the town, where stone bells hang above every doorway and danger lurks in the depths of the woods.

Justin Hawthorne's bloodline has protected Four Paths for generations from the Gray-a lifeless dimension that imprisons a brutal monster. After Justin fails to inherit his family's powers, his mother is determined to keep this humiliation a secret. But Justin can't let go of the future he was promised and the town he swore to protect.
Ever since Harper Carlisle lost her hand to an accident that left her stranded in the Gray for days, she has vowed revenge on the person who abandoned her: Justin Hawthorne. There are ripples of dissent in Four Paths, and Harper seizes an opportunity to take down the Hawthornes and change her destiny-to what extent, even she doesn't yet know.
The Gray is growing stronger every day, and its victims are piling up. When Violet accidentally unleashes the monster, all three must band together with the other Founders to unearth the dark truths behind their families' abilities... before the Gray devours them all." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

This story is told as third person omniscient and follows a few narrators around. So I'm going to break the summary down by what each of the narrators thinks in the beginning.

Violet moves to a quirky little town where her mother grew up after the death of her sister. She hasn't really ever been close to her mother due to her mother's personality, and her father is also gone. Violet doesn't really know much about either side of her family, and it has kind of always been her sister and her to survive the world. But now her sister is dead, and her mother's sister has early onset dementia, so Violet's mother moves them to a little town called Four Paths.

...which come on, that is a weird name for a town. Fight me.

Anyways, Violet is a little wary of the locals who all seems to kind of stare at her as if they simply don't know what to make of her.

On the flip side, Justin Hawthorne is the golden child...that really isn't. So Four Paths is apparently a town founded by four different families that each come with their own powers. These families have a ritual to perform to unlock their powers/gain control of their powers, and Justin did NOT complete his. The town is used to looking to the four families for protection since they have the power to protect the town from "the Gray" where the monster lives. 

...seriously, the Gray. These feels like an old 1920s comic book. ...maybe that's why they related it to Riverdale... Hmm...

Anyways, so Justin is constantly trying to live up to the expectations of his mother, the mayor, and not be crazy jealous of his sister who does possess the Hawthorne power. Since Justin is part of the four founding families, he gets treated with a weird amount of respect and reverence wherever he goes, almost as if he's the mayor of the town. Weird town for like adult to look to a teenager for leadership. ...also no one knows except for his mother and sister that he failed his ritual. The town is also looking closely at the four families as well due to the bodies that start appearing that clearly the monster has destroyed.

But I digress.

Then there's Harper. Harper also comes from a founding family, but lost part of her arm when she performed her ritual. This came across a little weirdly since at one point it mentions her hand is gone, but at another point, it kind of seems like the elbow and down is gone. However, I'm also a bit miffed that they didn't go through any of the steps to show how things might have to be tailored to Harper's situation in order for her to fully do everything. ...but... no seriously, that would have been nice, but I digress. Harper doesn't have any power, but she does have a lot of anger. Before she failed her ritual, she used to be BFFs with Justin, but after she failed her ritual, Justin basically will have nothing to do with her. The whole town has essentially ostracized her. Her family's line of power has also diminished, in the sense that her Dad doesn't really have as much power as his mom had, and for Harper not to have any, is well, bad.

ANYWAYS.

Justin and Harper both try to make friends with Violet for various reasons. They suspect Violet may have inherited her family's powers, but Violet has no clue about any of this deeper The Gray  business about Four Paths. Her mother doesn't remember much from her childhood in Four Paths, and it's whispered that it's amazing that she was able to successfully leave Four Paths. ...Violet accidentally visits the Gray and manages to escape. She's bewildered and kind of things she dreamed all of it, but then she has moments where she blacks out and wakes up somewhere else. She has a moment where she finds her aunt's cat dead in the woods, goes to pick it up, and the cat starts moving again. She somehow brought it back to life. Freaked out, Violet starts trying to figure out what's going on, and conveniently, she's got Harper and Justin to ask.

That is enough summary.

The story telling in this book was different since sometimes it got a little tedious. How the story started to unfold in the second half of the book was interesting, but I really wish the fourth family had a narrator. We got to see plenty of the fourth family's character, but like, a narrator would have been choice. Anyways, I think there will be a sequel, and I would be curious as to how it turns out, but this isn't on my list of top books to watch out for. I did enjoy reading it overall, but I thought some of the setting got a little weird. I know I stressed it's a little town, but I had no idea what the layout of the town was like at all. It was almost as if the story was told in the way that you would tell a childhood friend who grew up in the same town as you did. Like, you don't need to tell them that the gas station is next to that one bar, next to that one grocery store, on the corner of when avenue and what street. You just say the gas station and they know what you're talking about. A lot of the story kind of felt like that. It was also weird to me that it kept emphasizing it was a small town but then the founding families would have massive houses, and the town hall was also massive. ...it kind of made me wonder about the rest of the families. Like, if you're not in a founding family, why would you stay in a town so close to the Gray that people would randomly get sucked into by a monster, then returned as a mangled corpse!? There literally seems to be no incentive for anyone NOT in a founding family to stay in Four Paths. They have no powers, they may have a day job (there's only one diner so I'm very skeptical about this), and the best they can do to protect themselves is to wear stone amulets...but Justin reveals early on that they do nothing. So like, WHY. WHY. There doesn't seem to be anything remarkable about the town except for a high chance of being murdered by a monster.

I did like how the storytelling concentrated on knowing more about the town (Violet) so they could discover what their powers/ritual is (Violet) and I also liked the quips from the other character (founding family characters) that peppered in random trivia and illustrated some of the 'bad blood' kind of vibes. It's still weird to me that they snuck in a line about how if two members of different founding families had a kid, that kid would have no powers. ....like why would you spell that out in a teenage drama book. Like.....WHY. Are we also going to deal with teen pregnancy?! C'mon. 

Even though it was a bit of a hot mess, I probably will read the sequel, but again, it's not a top priority for me to read.

Happy reading!