Vengeful (The Villains #2) by V.E. Schwab (2018)

Fiction | Sci-Fi/Paranormal
Blurb:

“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.”
–Goodreads 

Book One: VICIOUS

pooled ink Review:

I’m going to go ahead and preface this review with a request that you take my review with a grain of salt because I’m pretty sure that I’m an outlier and honestly it’s annoying. Why is it annoying? Well because I became obsessed after reading Vicious and cannot understand why I don’t feel the same with Vengeful.

I mean, all the key elements that I loved in book one are here in book two. Characters return, the supervillain world grows, the reality of EOs develops, we meet new intriguing characters that love walking the line between enemy and ally, the smokey spiced ambiance of the writing is still alluring and smooth…Vengeful is a well-written, well-plotted, thrill-packed sequel! So why didn’t I love it??

To be honest I spent about a month trying to get through it. I’d read a few chapters at a time, I’d specifically schedule time to try and read this book, but each time I tried I got maybe a couple chapters in before my eyes dried out and I’d fall asleep (literally! I’d pass out for an nice hour-long nap) or switching to Netflix or tossing it aside for a different book on my to-read stack. I feel so frustrated because I’m not sure why this was the case! If you read my review for Vicious then you know I loved it!!! Ugh…

I will say that I felt the time jumps in this book were a bit confusing to keep up with. It was much more straightforwards in Vicious. In this book we’re juggling so many lead characters and timelines that instead of building intrigue or mystery I simply got mildly lost and bored. On one hand it added complexity, backstory, depth, and clever character connections but on the other hand I just didn’t really like it ha.

I also wasn’t the biggest fan of some of the new characters. There’s just something about the original cast that worked for me and unfortunately this new bigger badder cluster of players didn’t quite pull me in as much. (For example, June is a new character that stepped on my toes. She had me intrigued at first but the more she tried to pry Sydney from Victor and Mitch the more defensive I felt and the less I liked her).

The time jumps were a bit too much, the characters failed to reach my vault of emotions, and overall the pacing felt slow. Despite all odds and hopes this book did not excite me like I honestly thought it would. Maybe it’s just poor timing and I’m not in the right mood for it but…oh well, I guess.

Fortunately Vicious can be read as a standalone so I will definitely be re-reading that book many a time in the future. As for Vengeful though…I’ll probably try and read it again at some point (and if my thoughts change then I’ll update my review) but unless it clicks with me then I probably won’t bother much with it. *shakes head* The relationship between reader and book can be so peculiar and unpredictable at times.

Vengeful is a daring sequel that does not simply continue the Villains series but rather expands and deepens it. Curling with the darkness of supervillains battling for power and a government armed with cages, this follow-up dances with death as the old struggle to remain and the new march swiftly to conquer.

Cheers.

 Purchase Here: Vengeful

Check out the rest of the series: Vicious (book 1)