Genre: Adult Fantasy
Renhala Series, Book 2
| Note: My review might give some plot spoilers from the first book. Read at own risk.
Description (taken from Goodreads):
How do you live with a secret so dark and so deeply woven into your being that it threatens to smother your very existence, with no known way out? Use it to your advantage.
Kailey Rooke, karmelean, and now a possibly unethical karma-for-hire, has spent the past year jumping from project to project without any real hope for salvation. With repercussions from her actions at every turn, she discovers that as time goes on, she loses a bit more of herself to that which feeds on her anguish--that which is thriving inside her own body.
When a new contract to find a missing girl arises, Kailey attempts to put her past and its associated problems on the back burner, but she soon finds out that treachery and deceit lie shortly ahead in Golden Dunes, only giving face to new problems, with one leading right back to her childhood past.
She struggles to complete her contract as her own life teeters on a fulcrum, constantly tipping according to karma’s whim. How long will she keep her balance? Which way will she fall?
I must admit that I remember bits and pieces from the first one, but I don't remember everything. And this book does a fairly good job transitioning to the next story. That or maybe this series is like a tv series, you can jump into one without knowing the previous one and still enjoy it. Granted, I've read the first, and can't prove this theory firsthand (and I'd still tell you to read the first one).
Kailey, after the first book, kind of has a split personality with a thing called Sudo-Abominor inside of her. She's a happy willing-to-help woman who suddenly has something evil wanting to destroy everything living inside of her. And we get to see a lot of random split personality moments which kind of sort of makes me feel normal (granted I don't have an evil thing inside of me, I just fight over my own evilness). Anyways, let's move onto the story.
After finding out who she is, a karmelean, Kailey is has become a private investigator/mercenary for hire in Renhala. She's got her good friends: Lupa, Gunthreon, Jenna, Ladimer, and Connor to help her with her quests. A contract brings her to the Golden Dunes where we meet Madame Eve: a lady with snakes slithering around her that do her bidding and protect her from harm. While hired to find Madame Eve's daughter, she finds out nothing is as easy as it seems nor do people tend to be upfront with the truth. It's a mystery that she won't be able to figure out without her friends, but she'll certainly try to do everything on her own.
This is a fantasy that's one-of-a-kind and fun to get lost in. My only complaint is I feel like this is a story that happens as you go, it doesn't set the backstory up so the reader can try to figure out how it ends. Don't get me wrong, you can still guess, but bits and pieces get revealed as they occur in the story instead of alluding to them (or it was all over my head and I missed it if it was there).
It's a fun series filled with fantasy set in a world that hasn't been done before. It's like a fantasy tv series, only in book format (this is the only way I can describe it in non-bookish terms). And what would make it even cooler is a map of Renhala and glossary of terms.
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