Review: 4 1/2 stars - almost as good as Madeline Abducted
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 02 4, 2014
This book is another winner in this beautifully written series of "evil" meets "even more evil".  The gore and violence remain high, but palatable, because the author manages to engage your inner voyeur so well.  The Estate remains an intriguing world, although it feels like it played less of a role in this book than in the prior two.  Continued development of this world would have brought this up to 5 stars for me.As happens frequently in series like these, you see shifts in the original characters, and not always for the better.  I loved Xander in the first book - here he was less powerful somehow, almost like he had to be downright good in order to have love, while everyone else around him (except Maddie of course) descended even further into darkness.  Aaron seems to have a taken a "stupid" pill - he's got a hammerlock on power, and yet he doesn't seem compelled in any serious way to find the leak in his own inner circle that is trying to bring him down.  He went after the obvious sell-outs, but pretty much just scratched his head over the mole in his own house.  Maddie has gone from cellist to wise medicine woman - go figure where she earned her medical degree to treat Xander's broken bones.  You'd think they could afford to have a doctor on the payroll.Aside from the minor annoyance over character drift, I highly recommend this book.