Review: A Second Helping of Everything
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 2, 2014
This is the second of the Delphi books and starts up immediately where the first one ended at a semi-cliffhanger. You don't have to have read the first volume to read this one, but it sure helps on a lot of levels. The author takes great pains here in the first few chapters to summarize the earlier action and to bring the reader up to speed. This is great for someone who has read the first book because it very effectively reminds the reader of everything that happened in the first book. It would be possible to get enough from the recap if you hadn't read the first book, but it's just cryptic and bare bones enough that that would be a challenge. Perhaps more importantly, the first book was devoted heavily to establishing Arcanville, the main characters, and the mounting sense of dread and danger surrounding the heroes. That was a lot of the fun, and that scary thrilling mood is what helped readers overlook some awfully bumpy plotting. Without that background this second book could come across as pretty flat.As it is, this second book goes back over a lot of familiar ground. Lots of places are revisited and lots of old characters are reintroduced. For a vast conspiracy we sure spend a great deal of time in a physically and emotionally and dramatically confined space. That said, a new untrustworthy, smart and devious major played is introduced in  this book and she introduces new energy and unexpected complications that do move the story in some new directions. We also get a new bad guy, some unexpected twists and turns, and a number of surprises.The upshot for me is that the book is sort of a classic middle-of-three. Everything is moved along and the final act is set up. There are enough interesting pieces in play that this series feels like it will wind up strongly in Book Three, and so I'm willing to continue to go along for the ride.Please note that I received a free ecopy of this book in exchange for a candid review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.