Review: Nicely Enhances the Book Series
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 04 15, 2012
***NOTE MY REVIEWS OFTEN CONTAIN SPOILERS***The Darkest Powers Bonus Pack is a collection of short novellas that occur before and during The Darkest Powers Trilogy.  I'll review each story separately, but offer an overall rating for the collectionDangerousDerek is a werewolf who spent the first five years of his life in a research facility.  He started out with three other werewolves but when the others attacked a nurse they disappeared.  The only other child he sees is Simon and when Simon's dad offer to take him home Derek jumps at the chance.  Ten years later Derek, Simon and Simon's Dad have lived under various aliases, always hiding from Simon's Dad's former employers for reasons they don't understand.  When Derek severely injures a boy attacking Simon with a knife and makes the news it's time to move again.  But Simon's Dad doesn't arrive to pick them up at the appointed time and when they return home he's nowhere to be found.  Strangers are tracking them and they need to leave, will they find his Dad or will the strangers catch them first?The short story is a mix of a distant third person and a first person narrative from Derek's point of view.  I'm not a big fan of short stories because there's just not enough there for me which is a lot of the reason I didn't give this the best rating.  Despite its length the way the points of views are divided, the first portion told in the distant third person portraying Derek's childhood in the research facility followed by the first person narrative then years later, actually works well.  The beginning is distant but chilling and you can't help but feel for the little boy.  The second half you feel bad for Derek and how he's treated in the school environment, but events after that happen so face it's hard to read become attached to the characters or the story.  One issue I did have with this store is that the description of the fight scene doesn't match up with Simon's description of the same events in The Summoning and I personally feel Armstrong is an experienced enough writer that she should be making attention to detail mistakes.  However the story is definitely fast paced and combined with other series novels it does enhance understanding of the character in the series, but by its self because it's so short it's a little lacking.Derek is decently developed as a character in this story, but secondary characters are mostly told about rather than having their character traits shown due to space.  You know enough about the character for them to be distinctive, but not enough to become attached.  Derek's character however shows some decent development in the story offering pieces of him that we didn't get to see in the series.Overall if you're planning to read the Darkest Powers Trilogy I'd definitely recommend this short story, but if you're not there's not enough of the short story to hold interest as a standalone title.DividedDerek, Simon, Chloe and Rae may have escaped Lyle House but when they're separated at the factory yard they realize they're not out of danger just yet.  Derek and Simon manage to escape, but when they arrive to meet Chloe at the rendezvous point she's not there.  Will they be able to find Chloe before it's too late?This is a first person short story told from Derek's point of view which allows us to relive the warehouse scene through his eyes.  The actions of the initial scene are almost identical except for the thought patterns of course and that definitely started this piece off on a good note for me.  The plot offers a fast pace and some action, though not a lot.  One of the reason I like this story better than the first in this book is that it's much more emotionally invested than Dangerous was. Or maybe that would be better phrased as emotionally engaging or involved, not sure.  My point is that I felt a lot more connected to Derek's character in this novella than I did in the first.  Much of the story offers repeat background to those who've read The Awakening, but current happenings are shown, not just told about.  Though it's not meant to be a standalone novella, it does offer a nice additional depth to the main series novels by offering readers insight into Derek's mind as he views events from the novel.Other than Derek most of the character development is done by Derek telling the reader about the other characters and his impressions of them.  They're distinctive character, but not really fleshed out.  Derek's character however is nicely molded through a mixture of observing his actions and listening to him tell the reader about himself.Overall if you're reading or have read the Darkest Powers series you'll appreciate and enjoy this companion novella, if you're not reading the main series books though it will probably fall short since it wasn't written to be a standalone novel.DisenchantedWhen Victoria and Simon wake up on the bus without Chloe and Derek they must decide what to do now.  Do they have a chance of finding their missing companions before Edison groups finds them?This first person narrative begins in Simon's point of view before switching to Tori's for the majority of the story.  To be honest other than maybe offering a little more insight into that characters of Tori and Simon this story adds nothing to the series.  It doesn't even quite fit with the books.  First both Chloe and Derek left their bags and money on the bus in the books.  Even if Derek wasn't sitting with Tori, Chloe was sitting right next to Simon so they should have both seen their things and at minimum picked them up.  However this story makes no mention of their belongings.  Second the dream sequence in this story where Tori vaguely remembers the conversation with Chloe seems like an afterthought on the part of the writer.  Beyond this pretty much nothing happens in this short story.  There's no action, adventure or excitement, just a couple of teenagers traveling who spend most of their time fighting.Character development is pretty much the only thing this story has going for it.  We get a little more insight into Simon and his interest in Chloe at the beginning of the story and learn more about him through his conversation with Tori later in the story.  We gain a lot of insight into Tori's character in this tale because for once we see things from her point of view.  This is probably the first time in the series we can see Tori as something other than a bitch and that her actions actually start to make sense.  So for character development the story actually does really well adding depth to Tori and Simon's characters that we haven't seen in other Darkest Powers works.Overall if you have the time it's a nice insight into Simon and Tori, but otherwise it offers nothing to the series and I can't really recommend it.As far as the overall work The Darkest Powers Bonus Pack goes I would actually recommend the ebook to those reading the Darkest Powers series because it does go a long way for enhancing the secondary Darkest Powers characters.