Everbound (Everneath #2) by Brodi Ashton

* * * 3/4

Nikki Beckett could only watch as her boyfriend, Jack, sacrificed himself to save her, taking her place in the Tunnels of the Everneath for eternity — a debt that should’ve been hers. She’s living a borrowed life, and she doesn’t know what to do with the guilt. And every night Jack appears in her dreams, lost and confused and wasting away.

Desperate for answers, Nikki turns to Cole, the immortal bad boy who wants to make her his queen — and the one person least likely to help. But his heart has been touched by everything about Nikki, and he agrees to assist her in the only way he can: by taking her to the Everneath himself.

Nikki and Cole descend into the Everneath, only to discover that their journey will be more difficult than they’d anticipated — and more deadly. But Nikki vows to stop at nothing to save Jack — even if it means making an incredible sacrifice of her own.

Brodi Ashton certainly outdid herself in this heart-pounding follow-up to Everneath. This was such a page turner for me from start to finish.

Nikki is left in the lonely aftermath of Jack’s disappearance. It’s been months and there’s no word. Cole has disappeared too. She is determined to find him and get answers.  She is also dealing with her own welcome back party of sorts. Her father insists she go to counseling, Jack’s mother believes she’s somehow responsible for his disappearance and there are plenty of rumors going around about her involvement.  But the key is Cole. When he finally resurfaces, (groaner foul for that obvious pun!), Nikki seizes the opportunity to convince the unwilling immortal to take her through the Everneath so that she can rescue Jack. She realizes that through her dreams where Jack appears to her, she is somehow anchoring him to the physical world. This sliver of hope is all she needs. It takes some convincing to get Cole to agree. Strangely, I did feel bad for him. I mean seriously! In his mind Nikki is his soul mate, his destined Queen and she wants him to help rescue her mere mortal of a boyfriend. Awkward! And for good measure he makes his bandmate Max travel with them because as Cole admits, he tends to make stupid decisions where Nikki is concerned.

In my previous review of Everneath, I admitted that as much as I can’t resist those bad boys I just didn’t care for Cole. He started to win me over in Everbound. He shows a lighter side and his few vulnerable moments had me thinking there is may be some hope for him yet. And as single-minded as Nikki is in her quest to save Jack, she does develop feelings for Cole. As they travel through the Everneath she learns more about him, his origins and the world he longs for her to inhabit with him.

The Everneath itself is an incredibly confounding and treacherous world to travel through. It preys on your worst nightmares and fears. It truly is the survival of the fittest which makes this world so spectacularly dangerous. Nikki does her best to hold it together and many times Cole has to rescue her from making careless choices. It’s impressive that Nikki acknowledges some of Cole’s good qualities and the pain she’s putting him through. She’s under no illusion why he’s there in the Everneath with her. Still none of that dissuades her from her true mission.  

But the best part of Everbound is that nothing and no one can be taken at face value. Everyone has questionable motives and everyone’s fate is uncertain. Various encounters lead to more than a few mishaps and close calls and the making of new enemies here and there. Everbound ends with a spine-tingling thriller of a twist that suggests that the real fun has yet to begin!

~ Bel

Everneath by Brodi Ashton

* * * *

Available January 24, 2012

Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath, where immortals Feed on the emotions of despairing humans.  Now she’s returned – to her old life, her family, her best friend, her boyfriend – before she’s banished back to the underworld … this time forever. She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her; six months for goodbyes she can’t find the words for; six months to find redemption, if it even exists.

Nikki longs to spend these precious few months forgetting the Everneath completely and trying to reconnect with her boyfriend, Jack, the person most devastated by her disappearance – and the one person she loves more than anything.  But there’s just one problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who enticed her to the Everneath in the first place, has followed Nikki to the mortal world.  Cle wants to take over the Everneath’s throne and is convinces Nikki is the key to making it happen.  And he’ll do whatever it takes to bring her back, this time as his queen.

As Nikki’s time on the surface draws to a close and all of her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she is forced to make the hardest decision of her life: finding a way to cheat fate and remain on the surface with Jack, or returning to the Everneath and becoming Cole’s queen.

So there I was desperately looking for a book to read. Wait. Let me restate that. I had plenty of books to choose from but when I finally came across Everneath, I was suckered in. 

This intriguing debut infuses Greek and Egyptian mythology into a modern day romance. The Everneath is a place between the mortal world and hell, where Everlings (immortals) Feed on the emotions of humans, or Forfeits as they’re called. Once fed upon, the Everling and the Forfeit are tied together. By the time Nikki wakes up, she’s been asleep for one hundred years in the Everneath with the Everling, Cole. But in the mortal world she’s only been gone six months. Cole wants her to stay but Nikki feels a strong pull to return to her former life. Because of her choice, she has been physically  marked by the Shades that reside in the Tunnels. Choosing not to go with Cole means she has only six months before they come to claim her and Feed upon her for the rest of eternity. Yikes!

But returning to her old life isn’t so easy when so many things have changed. She used to be vibrant and outgoing but now with all her energy drained, she barely resembles who she was. So she hides from crowds and avoids contact with people, including Jack, her boyfriend, who was the only thing tying her to the mortal world while she was in the Everneath. It was his image she kept seeing during her hundred years sleep. Though she returned for him, she finds it hard to reconnect with him and her friends knowing that questions will come and explanations are in order. All the while, she counts down to when she must return to the Everneath.

This may come as a surprise to some of you, especially BiblioJunkies Nat – this time I did not find myself swooning over the “bad boy”, Cole. He’s a hard one to figure out. The push-and-pull connection Nikki feels with him only complicates her last six months. He comes off as very self-serving and untrustworthy. He has moments of kindness, plenty of snarkiness and his few hostile moments are a bit unsettling.  

Jack on the other hand is someone to root for.  He is so in love with Nikki and was so devastated by her disappearance. He’s so heartbreakingly patient with her as she tries to recover from her ordeal. No matter what she does, he waits for her cue and then follows suit. He’s just so sweet and handles her so delicately. His reassuring nature provides Nikki exactly what she needs – a safe haven. 

With Everneath, the first in a trilogy, Brodi Ashton delivers a very emotionally stirring and tantalizing tale. Each chapter is a countdown clock that only emphasizes the urgency Nikki experiences. It's so gutting to see her endure all the pain she's going through as D-Day draws closer. If she becomes an Everling herself, she’d have to Feed upon humans the way Cole did with her. Is that something her conscience can handle? Or is she brave enough to face the Tunnels for eternity? Either way people get hurt and she has to decide between the lesser of two evils.

~ Bel