The Madness Underneath (Shades of London #2) by Maureen Johnson

* * * *

Available February 26, 2013

After her near-fatal run-in with the Jack the Ripper copycat, Rory Devereaux has been living in Bristol under the close watch of her parents. So when her therapist suddenly suggests she return to Wexford, Rory jumps at the chance to get back to her friends. But Rory’s brush with the Ripper touched her more than she thought possible: she’s become a human terminus, with the power to eliminate ghosts on contact. She soon finds out that the Shades—the city’s secret ghost-fighting police—are responsible for her return. The Ripper may be gone, but now there is a string of new inexplicable deaths threatening London. Rory has evidence that the deaths are no coincidence. Something much more sinister is going on, and now she must convince the squad to listen to her before it’s too late.

 

 

Maureen Johnson is back with book 2 in The Shades of London series. As sequels go, this one is pretty stellar.

The Madness Underneath follows Rory as she picks up the pieces after her horrifying ordeal with The Ripper. Going to therapy sessions hasn’t helped since she can’t exactly reveal who she is or the circumstances surrounding her attack. Once thing becomes certain – now that she’s a terminus and has the power to remove ghosts permanently, she’s even more valuable. The return to Wexford is welcomed but Rory does feel like a fish out of water. She's pretty much faking normal and it eats at her. Her awkward reunion with Stephen, Boo and Callum is the only thing that keeps her going. And Stephen, as uptight and rigid as he is about procedure and his personal life, is an odd source of comfort for Rory. Their contrasting natures do at times provide some of the lighter moments in the book, especially when Rory starts on one of her tangents and Stephen has to reel her in.

The new string of murders immediately piques Rory’s interest when she makes a connection between the murders and her attack. Sometimes sequels don’t quite live up to the hype. However, this is a quiet, under-the-radar mind trip  that slowly builds upon Rory’s failure to keep up at school,  her growing isolation from her peers and her deepening involvement with the murders. All this adds to the imbalance and anxiety. You don't quite realize it's all falling to pieces until it actually does.

The Madness Underneath is MUST READ.  The suspense throughout held my attention and I was completely on edge as the ending crept closer leaving me stunned with a cliffhanger I soooooo did not expect!

 

~ Bel

Legend by Marie Lu

*** ½

Description taken from back cover:

Born into an elite family in one of the Republic’s wealthiest districts, fifteen-year-old June is a military prodigy committed to her country.

Born into the slums of Republic’s Lake Sector, fifteen-year-old Day is the country’s most wanted criminal.

From different worlds, June and Day have no reason to cross paths-until the day June’s brother, Metias, is murdered.  And Day becomes the prime suspect.

Now, caught in the ultimate game of cat and mouse, Day is in a race for his family’s survival while June tries desperately to avenge Metias’s death.  But in a shocking turn of events, the two uncover the truth of what has really brought them together and the sinister lengths to which their country will go to keep its secrets.

I was lucky enough to snag an ARC of Legend via librarything.com.  I have been sitting on it for a little while as I have been a little nervous to read it.  Just in case you weren’t aware, I LOVE The Hunger Games.  Worse yet, THG was the first and only dystopian series I have read.  With that being my basis for comparison, I was afraid that my expectations would be too high and that they wouldn’t be met.  But this week, I decided to put my fears aside and moved Legend to the top of my to-be-read pile.  And I am glad that I did.

Let me get The Hunger Games comparison out of the way first.  The only similarity between the two books is that they take place in a dystopian society where the government negatively controls everything one way or another.  Other than that, throw all your other preconceived THG-based dystopian ideas out the window.  The two books are nothing alike and I couldn’t have been happier about that fact. 

There were a couple things that I really didn’t care for in this book.  First, as much as I love romance, I actually would have preferred the romance to be taken more slowly or removed all together.  Regardless of the events that take place in the book, I would have expected there to be a lot more distrust between Day and June.  Second, everything seemed to be a little underwhelming and I felt that a lot of the story was predictable.  With the exception of a couple scenes, nothing shocked or surprised me. 

But you know what? This still turned out to be a really fun novel.  Marie Lu’s skills/strengths are in developing her main characters and making a story move.  Maybe I don’t think June and Day should be each other’s romantic interest but that doesn’t mean I didn’t absolutely love them individually.  Day is a future-day Robin Hood which makes you want to root for him immediately.  June is a girl that is very driven and not afraid to use her extreme intelligence to reach her goals (it was probably the military aspect but she made me think of a young Honor Harrington).  They are both very strong characters which is always a plus with the Bibliojunkies.

And even though I found a lot of this story to be predictable, that doesn’t mean it was at all slow.  Lu did an amazing job of making the action flow quickly.  This along with the love of the main characters made it difficult to put the book down.  I admit to staying up until 4 a.m reading Legend.  I finally had to force myself to go to sleep even though I only had 40 pages left.  No matter how much I was enjoying the book, those adorable pesky toddlers would be up bright and early only a few short hours later.   

The only problem now?  I have learned the down-side of reading an Advanced Readers Copy…the wait is even longer when you are looking forward to the next installment in the series.  And I will DEFINITELY be looking forward to the sequel to Legend.

Nat