Review Detail

Reader reviewed by ALA

The companion to "A Great and Terrible Beauty" does not disappoint!

The adventures of Gemma and her friends continue, but the peril is much greater now. Gemma is warned by her friend Kartik that she must find a certain temple within the realms before Circe and her followers do. There she must bind the magic, for it has been running freely through the realms for too long now. Gemma cannot find the temple alone. She knows this, and must trust her friends to help her. But with the magic runnig loose, none within the realms can be trusted. Gemma must rely on instinct to stay alive, find the temple, and keep what happened at the end of th first book from repeating itself.

Outside the realms trouble is stirring too. There is a new teacher at school-one who seems to know something. Gemma must discover whether she is a foe or ally-her life may depend on it.

Fate leads Gemma to Nell Hawkins, a girl in an insane asylum who claims to have driven herself mad to keep Circe from using her. Gemma needs to retain information from her, but how much of what she says is true, and how much is the rabble of a lunatic? Can Gemma solve the riddles and find the temple before it is too late?

Before I read Rebel Angels, I was afraid that in the time it took Libba Bray to write a second book, it wouldn't quite flow from the first one. I was proved wrong! the book seems more like someone took a machete and chopped this book right off the last chapter of "A Great and Terrible Beauty" than someone wrote it seperately. I love the dialogue style the book is written in, and I am happy that she could incorporate humor and embarrassment without ruining the mysterious and formal style of the book. Libba Bray is so good at making the book "fantastically" realistic. This book is a must read!