Saturday, March 12, 2016

Aguirre, Ann. Public Enemies.

Aguirre, Ann.  Public Enemies.  Macmillan/Farrar Strauss  2015  378p  $17.99  ISBN 978-1-250-02466-4  hs    Fantasy     VG     

In the sequel to Mortal Danger, Edie Kramer learns what it means to be a player in the Immortal Game, facing powerful enemies and making alliances with monsters to save the people she loves before it’s too late.  She has only six months to save her boyfriend Kian, but he is not the only person at risk, as it becomes plain when her dangerous immortal enemies begin to attack her friends and allies with terrible, often deadly consequences.

This book feels like a significant departure from its predecessor, abandoning the high-school aspect almost completely in order to focus on a new and varied cast of characters who are mostly villainous in one way or another.  Edie’s personality also seems to have changed radically, which is a shame, because at this point she’s taken a turn toward the generic YA heroine, and become somewhat bland.  Kian, too, has lost much of what made him intriguing in Mortal Danger.  But the new characters are very interesting indeed, which makes up for the difference, after a fashion.

Generally speaking, this is still a well-written, interesting book, but it seems to suffer from a case of
Second Book Slump.  Nevertheless, readers will feel compelled to keep up with the series, just to see how things proceed after the shocking ending Aguirre has written to this book.
     
Summary: In this sequel to Mortal Danger, Edie Kramer learns what it means to be a player in the Immortal Game, facing powerful enemies and making alliances with monsters to save the people she loves before it’s too late.     


Mythology-Fiction, Romance-Fiction, Survival-Fiction  --Bethany Geleskie

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