Review-Thornhill

Last year I read a debut novel that had been blurbed by Body Finder author Kimberly Derting and I loved it.  Werewolf murder mystery, enough said.  When I heard there were ARCs of the sequel I traded whatever I had to to get a copy, although again I've come down to the wire reading it before it comes out.  Once I started this book and got past my initial "wait, what happened in book one again" moment, I was down for reading large chunks of it at a time.  This book follows Mac and her friends as their adventures continue, but for this one Kathleen pulled out what are very much like concentration camps, only they're for werewolves.  That made me super happy (and I say that from a reader's standpoint just because they're interesting.  I would love if things like that never existed again).  The first book was chill-inducing, but this one made me break out in full-on shivers, because it stars one of those characters that TRULY believes that what they're doing, hurting some to "help" many is the RIGHT thing to do, and in real life those people are the scariest of all.  Sure, that crazy guy that likes to slice people up in his van is nightmare worthy, but he's not gonna lock up thousands of people because he thinks he's helping them.  Kathleen perfectly captures this attitude in the book's villain, and I loved seeing old and new characters come together in this new story.  Despite the fact that this is the sequel to Hemlock I almost feel that it could stand alone in terms of plot, although one might be mighty confused about the characters.  I can't wait to see how this series ends, especially because Kathleen seems to be really good at the suspense/action parts of her books, which makes me think book three will really pack a punch.  Hopefully it will come out within a year of this one unlike this book (it came out over a year after the first one), but if not I will trust it's so that Kathleen is making it into the best book it can be.  Fans of the first book will be excited to finally get this installment in the series, although don't expect the same story line told slightly different this time, there are big changes for our beloved characters, and not all of them are happy.  In fact, almost none of them are.

Out September 10, 2013

4.5/5 dust spirits

*I received this ARC via a swap with another blogger, but that does not change the fact that this is my honest opinion on the book.