The Darkest Powers Trilogy by Kelley Armstrong

****

Book #1 - The Summoning

Book #2 - The Awakening

Book #3 - The Reckoning

The Darkest Power Trilogy focuses on Chloe Saunders.  Not long after she turns fifteen she has a frightening encounter with a janitor at school.  A janitor that, according to everyone else, doesn’t exist.  The experience lands her with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and an extended stay at Lyle House – a house for troubled teens. 

At Lyle House, kids are periodically removed once they have adequately responded to treatment.  But a few of Chloe’s housemates begin to suspect differently.  Once they begin to investigate their suspicions, Chloe learns of a world she never knew existed and she and her new friends search for a way to escape in order to survive.

This trilogy is not something I would normally have picked up but Barnes and Noble told me to buy it (based on my previous purchases) and I listened.  And I am glad that I did.  This is a fun and scary series.  I personally enjoyed the true youthfulness of the characters.  They act their age.  Chloe acts like a girl that JUST turned fifteen.  She is sometimes timid and she is excited and scared to death to someday experience her first kiss.  You still get the teen angst required in this genre but it feels so believable that I found it much less annoying than usual.  I also loved the romance in this series.  Partially because it is NOT the focus of the story.  But I also loved it because it was so sweet and believable.  It takes a while for the two of them to realize they are even attracted to each other.  And when they do finally discover it, it isn’t forbidden and it isn’t perfect.  I won’t tell you who the two are.  That would be a spoiler indeed and I am trying to avoid that - crazy hard to do when you are reviewing three books at once.

I will warn you that Kelley Armstrong ends this trilogy with unfinished business.  BUT…Her new YA trilogy Darkness Rising explores the same world.  And her intent is to bring Chloe and her group of friend together with the cast from Darkness Rising at some point.  So we may get more closure in the future.

So in the end, I definitely recommend these.  If you are a big wuss like me, you will probably get scared while reading these.  But if you are like most NORMAL people, these books will provide some suspense and some definite creepy moments.  However, the normal people probably won’t run through the house turning on every light possible.  Not that I did that at all….

Nat

Nat