Review: Sexy, Scary, Creepy.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 31, 2013
The Devil's Reprise is the highly anticipated follow-up to last year's scary as all hell The Devil's Metal. Both books take place in the 70's during the height of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. In The Devil's Metal, we meet Dawn Emerson. She is a small town former rodeo queen who aspires to be a music journalist. Her dreams come true when she is offered the opportunity to go on tour with her favorite rock group, Hybrid, and document everything for Creem magazine. Dawn also has a thing for Hybrid's enigmatic, dark-souled guitarist, Sage Knightly. Unfortunately for Dawn, she gets much more than she bargained for on that tour with demons and ultimate groupies straight from hell all around. Dawn discovers Sage has made a deal with the devil, and he is coming to collect his due. The story that unfolds there is not to be missed.Reprise picks up almost a year later. Dawn has spent her time finishing up school and being with her family. Sage--well, Sage has been busy being a rock star. The guilt of being one of the fortunate few that survived his deal with the devil weighs heavily on him. It weighs on him so heavily that, as I read the first few chapters of Reprise, I am SHOCKED at where he is and who he has become. What the hell has happened to him? Where is the Sage I fell in love with in The Devil's Metal? He's finding solace in drugs and alcohol and trying to forget what has happened in all the WRONG ways. I don't know if I want to kick him or bring him to a therapist's office. Well, we don't have time for option two because he's about to embark on his first solo tour and he needs a music journalist to document his tour. Who better than Dawn Emerson?As Dawn arrives in Paris with a familiar photographer in tow, the story starts to unfold. We knew at the end of The Devil's Metal that Dawn might have made her own deal with the Devil, although she forgets the conditions, and it's abundantly clear that he is coming to collect. While this is Dawn's story, I couldn't help but focus on Sage. With this being told from a dual POV, I loved the look into his thoughts and feelings. I have to say that the Sage at the beginning of this book is nothing like the Sage we see towards the end. He mans up BIG time, and I have to thank one of my all-time favorite secondary characters, Jacob, for giving him the swift kick he needed. I had almost forgotten how much I loved the grumpy, snide ginger.As always Ms. Halle's writing is what gets to me. She has the unique ability to draw me into the scenes as if I were a character in the book experiencing everything first hand. I was SCARED, nervous, anxious, filled with dread, and hopelessness. I laughed and cried at points. This book seemed a whole lot creepier than The Devil's Metal. Of course the off-the-charts, steamy scenes help comfort me throughout this story. Watching the relationship between Sage and Dawn grow as they reconnected and found each other again was awesome. The chemistry they have is off the charts, and you can't help but feel the pull when reading about their relationship. As always the character development here was wonderful, and Karina continues to show us that she can write a fantastic book regardless of genre.