Villains #2 Vengeful by V.E. Schwab 4.5/5 Award: Goodreads Choice Award for Science Fiction (2018) Version française: Vengeful (tr. Sarah Dali, Lumen éditions) *Minor spoilers from the first novel included! Summary Sydney once had Serena—beloved sister, betrayed enemy, powerful ally. But now she is alone, except for her thrice-dead dog, Dol, and then there's Victor, who thinks Sydney doesn't know about his most recent act of vengeance. Victor himself is under the radar these days—being buried and re-animated can strike concern even if one has superhuman powers. But despite his own worries, his anger remains. And Eli Ever still has yet to pay for the evil he has done. My thoughts What an improvement! For a book that was not supposed to happen, Vengeful is so much better than the first installment. Initially, Vicious was to be a standalone, but I am so glad that following its success Schwab changed her mind. In this second book, we keep in touch with our favourite characters Eli, Victor and the gang, but we get introduced to two new main figures: Marcella and June. Eli remains the twisted, God-fearing character we love to hate (and he remains my personal favourite). Victor continues his Robin Hood path, except instead of stealing the rich to give to the poor, he kills those who might betray him to save the greater number of ExtraOrdinaries (EOs). I was never truly into Dominic, Sydney or Mitch, because their relevance in the story is truly dependent on Victor’s existence. However, they remain good characters that serve the same purpose as Neville Longbottom: mostly decorative until they kill a big snake. We cannot talk of Vengeful, however, without mentioning Marcella. Marcella, Marcella, Marcella. She carried this whole story on her back. On this blog, we love a gender-discriminated morally devious underdog with powers of inhalation. Marcella is the smartest character in this novel, and I guarantee that you will root for her. What was perhaps the most fun was that we got to see her entire origin story: from pre-trauma to her EO transformation and subsequent domination. Like Victor, she finds two sidekicks, June and Jonathan. Jonathan is highly forgettable. June is another good character. She is probably the more 'traditional' one – angsty, misunderstood assassin/living voodoo doll (admittedly one of the cooler EO powers thus far). Schwab loves her strong female characters. In Vicious, Serena was powerful, but mostly a mouthpiece for Eli. In Vengeful, the combination of Marcella, June and Sydney is the perfect powder keg and makes for an explosive, weirdly empowering novel considering they mostly deal in the business of killing people. If there was one downside to the novel, it would be the structure. Schwab constructed the novel with each main character having its own chapters. However, there was an imbalance in the pacing meaning that we would get long streaks focusing only on one or two characters. Hence, when we would get back to our other protagonists, it was hard to remember where we had left them.
The plot as in Vicious, was fast-paced and highly entertaining while not sacrificing authenticity. We also dive into a new environment as Marcella becomes tied with the Merit mafia. The power trip that comes from being involved in such high-risk high-reward circumstances made Vengeful that much more entertaining while managing not to be overly cliché. Without spoiling, Schwab also made the timeline so are in an extended flashback until the end. We trace back the steps of every character until the present day where they all come together in one massive be-all and end-all fight. It was like following the Hansel and Gretel’s breadcrumbs. Now, the duology has apparently turned into a trilogy (though it remains unconfirmed by Schwab herself, there is a Goodreads page for a third, untitled novel with no affiliated publisher or publication date – so take it with a grain of salt). Basically, we have no clue what is going to happen. However, if this is the end, it is certainly a glorious one. If you liked Vengeful, you will love… The Firebird series by Claudia Gray The Raven Cycle by Maggie Stiefvater The Chaos Walking series by Patrick Ness
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