Info & Picture taken from Amazon
2 STARS
HEROES FOR HIRE
After barely escaping a madman’s attempt to annihilate all MetaHumans, Kelly Meding’s supernatural crime fighters have banded together to take back the streets of war-ravaged Los Angeles.
Dahlia “Ember” Perkins still feels like an outsider among her new Meta friends, despite everything she’s been through since coming into her miraculous ability to absorb heat and extinguish fires. But when the police need help investigating human skins discarded like slipcovers on the street, the Metas’ youngest team member quickly finds her place. Evidence points to a murderer the likes of which they have never encountered but who inexplicably seems to be gunning for Dahlia—and who may be neither human nor Meta. After a bullet meant for her nearly kills one of her teammates, Dahlia uncovers a connection to the crimes buried deep in her past. As the danger escalates and her personal life falls apart, Dahlia soon learns there’s no such thing as a “normal” relationship when you’re a superhero. . . .
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Normally I try not to spoil stuff in my reviews, but I'm not sure I can do that this time. So fair warning, there are spoilers.
I was seriously disappointed in this book. I really enjoyed the first book of this series, Trance, but this one just falls so flat.
First, Dahlia was such a weak character after reading about Teresa. And at first, it works. Dahlia is new to the group and uncertain of her place in it. But her character didn't change much by the end of the book. If anything, she sounded weaker by the end than she did in the beginning.
Second, this book was both predictable and then confusing. I totally saw it coming that Noah would be a bad guy. The moment the whole Changeling thing was explained I said to my self, "And Noah is totally one of them". The middle of the story was one big ball of What the Hell is Happening. There is so much misdirection that it's just too confusing.
Third, the ending is totally insane, in a bad way. There is a cool fight scene, granted, with bad guy characters we just met and so have no emotion towards because their motives are weak. But the very end is totally wrong. I understand having a cliff hanger at the end. The first book had that a little bit, in the form of "Now that's we're all together what do we do now?" Which totally works. But this? "Oh look, I'm stuck in my boy friend's body with no way out, I guess I'll go to sleep now." No.
This book was hovering at a three or four stars for me until that ending. And I really hate giving this such a bad rating. It makes me sad because I liked the first book so much.
I do think this book suffers from that Second Book in the Series Syndrome. Where the first book is a solid start, and could pretty much be a stand alone book because all the major loose ends are tied up. Authors write the first book that way because there's no guarantee that the rest of the series will be published. But then they write the second book and to make sure that you will read the third and fourth book they leave a lot of ends loose. Forcing you to read the next books if you want to know what happens. And for the most part that's okay and it works. But this time around, leaving such a huge issue up in the air is just maddening.
There is a third book coming out soon, like later this year, and while I want to know what happens I'm not sure I'll be reading it.
Thanks for reading! Have a great Monday! What books are you reading this month? Leave a comment for me below or on my Facebook or Twitter.
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