Wow, this is a powerfully good book. I'd ignore the back blurb for the most part, because that's not quite what this book is about.
Since the previous book ended on a cliffhanger, I'll have to put the review below the spoiler cut. But this gets five stars. Epic awesome.
P.S. I just want to say that I'm pleased to see that in the back of the book, the author is now allowed to come out as a girl. She writes guys extraordinarily well, and it's nice that she can now take the credit for the cross-gender work.
Spoilers for the first half of the book or so coming up...
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So, the Auphe are back. Eighteen of them somehow managed to survive Cal's previous killings. And...all 18 of them are women. Yup, that makes Cal the last Auphe male...and they want him alive. And they make it clear that they want to kill everyone Cal loves, starting with Niko if they can manage it.
In other news, Promise lines the Leandros boys up with a job working for her vampire ex, Seamus, who's being followed by somebody and it's creeping him out. The job, however, is quickly overshadowed by Seamus deciding he wants Promise back and he's willing to take out Niko in order to do it. Soon Seamus ends up dead and out of the story for the most part, and nobody misses him. (Guess who done it?) But this plotline soon gets overshadowed by the arrival of Promise's daughter Cherish, who you may have spotted in a photo in her house before. Cherish looks real cute, but she's a thief and has really questionable morals. And she's on the run from a guy who she stole from, Oshossi. Nobody's terribly thrilled with Cherish, but out of loyalty to Promise, the guys offer to help her out. Cherish also comes with a pet chupacabra, which is more interesting than you expect it to be.
Between the impending Auphe siege and Oshossi sending various animals to go after the gang, Cal and Niko are busy boys, and at one point go into hiding. Cal develops his Auphe side in an attempt to think like them...which is worrying. He also gets a lot better at making gates, which is creepy, but extremely useful in this book.
I thought a book called "Deathwish" was going to have Cal go to the really dark side and try to sacrifice himself so that the Auphe won't get anyone else. Well, he certainly considers it, but the book never quite goes there because Niko would insist on dying as well.
I haven't mentioned yet that Niko is co-narrator of this book. Which is awesome. You get his perspective into things, such as realizing that he probably would have come out pretty horrible if Cal hadn't existed and he'd been left alone with Sophia. Niko has a high standard of honesty after having grown up with a big fat liar, and he's convinced that Promise is an honest person, even if there are some things she doesn't want to mention in her past. And you get the pain he feels when he finds out that Promise hasn't mentioned freaking having a kid, or how deep her past connection to Seamus was. (By the way, I found Cal's perspective on Promise lying to be really interesting. You can see how the guy's grown in that he's all, "Look, she might not be perfect, but I enjoyed having a happy brother around the house, and I can be the suspicious one for the both of us," rather than "Kill her now.") And when Niko runs into trouble, you really see how haunted he is by his few past failures to keep Cal alive and out of Auphe hands.
I have one plot quibble I have to mention. I'm not a parent and don't spend that much time with 4-year-olds, but how possible would it be for a 4-year-old to take care of an infant RIGHT AFTER it's born? I'm talking freshly delivered here. We find out in this book that is what happened to Niko, and I'm still trying to conceive of how a 4-year-old, even Niko who grew up fast and is pretty well perfect, could have done this. (I can't help but think maybe the author should have made Niko six years older than Cal.)
At this point I'm going to have to save the rest of my major commentary for the MAJOR spoiler space (don't scroll down farther if you really don't want to know) below the little astericks. I will just say for now that the ending is freaking POWERFUL and I can't stop thinking about it and I'm still carrying the book around rereading it.
Ending spoiler space- don't look on if you haven't read the whole book yet:
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On another note, George makes a brief appearance in this book (thanks to Niko's narration, she can), but I actually think that after this book, she may very well drop out of the series. She continues to say that she "can't" help the boys with any future viewing (Cal is all, "She's just not going to tell you anything like usual," and he ain't wrong), and this time clarifies that she has looked into the future before AND was unable to change it. Well, that explains a lot. But if she's totally unable to help the boys (and I guess she doesn't help people in the ice cream store beyond a low level), and Cal won't be getting involved with her, and she's pretty well impotent when it comes to the big fight...I can't help but think that I don't see any place for her in these books any more unless she undergoes a drastic change. And maybe that's fine. I certainly got over my Cal/George shipping after this. I think Cal did too with his realization that she's the one keeping them apart rather than his own issues.
Okay, now on to the big ending:
Cal takes out the Auphe with a nuke! They are all gone! BOOYAH! Had to say that.
Now, the funny thing is, this book has the boys taking out their lifelong enemy...and yet, that's not even the Big Ending to this one. The Big Ending is when Niko suspects something's funny with the Oshossi situation ("really, he's that upset over a necklace?"), goes to talk to Cherish about it, comes home...and finds Cal dead, having been killed by Oshossi's animals. And Niko utterly loses it and becomes an empty killing machine bent on going after Oshossi. Oh, the irony of Cal surviving the Auphe but not this guy...
Except Cal's not dead. Turns out the chupacabra is what Cherish stole, and the chupa can make you have visions of whatever the owner wants you to see. Yup, Cherish is straight-up evil, and Niko wants her dead. (Promise, in the end, can't argue with that, though the relationship does take a pause for awhile.)
And Niko is traumatized for months after this. The book doesn't skimp on this, since he's unable to block that memory out of his head. Delilah recommends a course of physical action for the guy, and Cal uncomplainingly spars, runs, exercises, and even meditates with Niko. He even posts a picture of himself at age 5 stomping on Santa Claus's nuts with a note saying, "Cal's alive. Now get off your ass and fix him breakfast" on Niko's headboard when he realizes that Niko wakes up every day thinking he's dead. Awwwwwwww. And eventually, Niko starts to recover. And it's beautiful. I give major props to the author for the handling and development of Niko's worst nightmare coming true (but not really) and what it does to him. And how Cal is finally like, "Look, now it's MY responsibility to keep me alive."
Anyway....very, very good job with this, handling the different brokenness of the brothers and how they help each other heal in the end. I especially enjoyed how Cal steps up in this one.
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