(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).
(This review may contain spoilers).
I’d give this book 3.5 stars out of 5, ideally. It was good to see Lena and her friends appear again, but I did think that she was a bit too obsessed with getting back to see her boyfriend. While it was clear she missed him, I felt that she considered seeing him more important than her family members. (Not so much her dad… but definitely her mom and ‘adopted’ family members).
I really liked seeing Wilma again in this book. It was good to see her not taking nonsense from anyone… and yet also wanting to protect Lena and keep her safe. I also liked seeing Lena’s friendship with Belva… and how Belva and Farren were clearly romantically interested in each other. I also liked the fact that there were things about Belva that were special, instead of it just being about Lena.
It was good to see Lena’s feelings towards her past self and I felt the author captured her resentment/jealousy really well. Although not an attractive trait, it did help her to appear more human and enabled me to become more sympathetic towards her. I also liked being able to meet Winston and see how good he was… and the fact that he didn’t match Lena’s mental image of him at all was amusing and, I felt, really worked for the story.
I wasn’t especially fond of the fact that there were two occasions where the first person perspective slipped into third. I felt that was unnecessary and revealed plot twists earlier to myself as a reader, which made them lose their effectiveness.
I liked being able to see more of Arcas and the fact that the inhabitants of the world weren’t the scary creatures they came across as in the previous book. I would have liked the opportunity to get to know some of the other characters more, although I did think that Lena went through a good character journey through the course of this book.
I don’t know if I’d read book three as it stands. This was entertaining and easy to read… but there were a few issues I would like to see addressed.
Ink of Blood 