Between The Spark and The Burn
by April Genevieve Tucholke
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Expected Publication Date: August 14th 2014
Thanks Liberty Bay Books for the ARC!
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Freddie once told me that the Devil created all the fear in the world.
But then, the Devil once told me that it’s easier to forgive someone for scaring you than for making you cry.
The problem with River West Redding was that he’d done both to me.
The crooked-smiling liar River West Redding, who drove into Violet’s life one summer day and shook her world to pieces, is gone. Violet and Neely, River’s other brother, are left to worry—until they catch a two a.m. radio program about strange events in a distant mountain town. They take off in search of River but are always a step behind, finding instead frenzied towns, witch hunts, and a wind-whipped island with the thrum of something strange and dangerous just under the surface. It isn’t long before Violet begins to wonder if Neely, the one Redding brother she thought trustworthy, has been hiding a secret of his own . . .
But then, the Devil once told me that it’s easier to forgive someone for scaring you than for making you cry.
The problem with River West Redding was that he’d done both to me.
The crooked-smiling liar River West Redding, who drove into Violet’s life one summer day and shook her world to pieces, is gone. Violet and Neely, River’s other brother, are left to worry—until they catch a two a.m. radio program about strange events in a distant mountain town. They take off in search of River but are always a step behind, finding instead frenzied towns, witch hunts, and a wind-whipped island with the thrum of something strange and dangerous just under the surface. It isn’t long before Violet begins to wonder if Neely, the one Redding brother she thought trustworthy, has been hiding a secret of his own . . .
I had no idea there was going to be a “conclusion” to Between The Devil and The Deep Blue Sea. I did quite a bit of screaming and flailing when I acquired the first book, (also via Liberty Bay Books, so thanks for that guys!) so I’m afraid my review of it wasn’t entirely coherent or professional, but you can read it here anyways and let my blabbing rock your socks off.
I feel a lot of things about this book and I’m not entirely sure where to start so I think I’ll do it chunk by chunk again.
Writing: In my review of BTDaTDBS (yeah I know but as Cait commented on my last stacking the shelves post it gets really ridiculous to write it all out.), Toucholke’s writing impressed the pants off of me (don’t worry it wasn’t scandalous)! I loved the weird lyrical and old-time-y way she wrote and it really fit Violet’s personality and the entire setting, but I felt like it was kind of lost in the second book. I missed it. The writing was still really good, but I didn’t feel/hear that larger than life and extremely poetic voice anymore. So I was a little bit disappointed by that.
Characters: I still loved the characters the second time around. Brody kind of confused me because his personality became inconsistent and jumbled, although I know that was the whole point. I felt like everyone’s personalities seemed kind of dulled down, with the exception of Neely, compared to book one. But I loved ’em to death anyway, because even dulled down, they were great!
Love Component: This part bothered me tremendously. Violet wobbled back and forth between her two men and never really decides. She changes her mind almost every page and tries to have “the best of both worlds.” I found this to be quite annoying. It was also really unnecessary, it didn’t add to the story in any way, in my opinion. At the very least though, it made sense for her to be torn between the two, and I kind of liked the way it ended…kinda.
Plot: Was interesting and uninteresting at the same time. I didn’t see the biggest plot twist coming, although I feel like I should have. It was good but not amazingly complex or anything.
General Thoughts: It pretty much paled comparison to the first one. It was still really great though and I wolfed it down. So it’s still a four star great read for me and I’d highly recommend it. I think the only reason I didn’t like it was my high expectations from the first one. I know it sounds like I hated it, but really I didn’t. I still loved it!
Gif. Consensus:
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