Fever (The Chemical Garden #2)

With Sever, the third and final book in the Chemical Garden Trilogy, set to release in February, I figured I should read Fever so I was actually caught up for once. As you may remember, Wither was not my favorite dystopian of all time. In fact, I had some major issues with it, but it was still a unique and interesting book and I definitely wanted to know what happened to Rhine and Gabriel after their harrowing escape from the mansion. Fever promised to be a completely different type of story. Rhine was away from the opulence and seductive danger of the mansion and now we were going to get to see more of the gritty, treacherous, real world as she hunted for her twin, Rowan. I had my concerns because I had heard from a lot of readers that this book suffered greatly from \”middle book syndrome\”, just a go between, betwixt two awesome plots. Luckily I very much disagree with this. I found Fever to be just as interesting and even more emotional and exciting than the first book. I felt that I really got to know Rhine and Gabriel in this book, as well as the world that they inhabit. LIKES: Dystopian Roadtrip!: Rhine and Gabriel travel up the East Coast in a very dystopian \”where are we going to sleep tonight and who is going to watch out for kidnappers\” kind of way. The come across everything from a brothel circus, to a creepy cafe owner and little old lady who happens to be a psychic. They also gain and adorable and awesome companion who really tugs at the heartstrings, but I won\’t get into that here. This setup really keeps the plot moving and kept me involved, I wanted to see where they would end up next and whom they would run into. Rhine and Gabriel finally get real: One of the things that really bugged me in the last book was that Rhine ran away with Gabriel even when she barely knew him and couldn\’t possibly be in love with him. I was afraid that this book would continue that trend but I was so wrong. Gabriel acted like a real human being. He spent most of the book, seemingly, questioning whether he should have come at all. The mansion was a beautiful prison, but the real world is hellish. He obviously cared about Rhine but they weren\’t about to jump into bed with each other. In this book they lean on one another for support while their relationship develops and goes through it\’s ups and downs. I felt like I liked them more and could relate better. Beautifully Grotesque: this book was much grittier than the last and that added to the realism and also made for a much more beautiful narrative about freedom and sacrifice and love. DISLIKES: Where is Cecily: When I first saw the cover I assumed there would be a bit of Cecily in this book. I really wanted to know what was happening with her and the baby back at the mansion, but unfortunately she plays a minuscule role in this book. The Ending: Okay, I\’m not going to go into any kind of detail because I don\’t want to spoil anything, but I was just so mad with how this book ended. First of all, I just felt like it was a bit forced and could have been written in a way that wasn\’t such a let-down. Second, CLIFFHANGER, seriously? Ugh! I know they make people want to read the next book but they\’re frustrating as hell. *pout* I\’m so happy that I didn\’t find this book to be a \”middle book\” bore. This series keeps getting better and I can\’t wait to read Sever when it comes out on Feb. 12. Especially after that cliffhanger, I guess it worked then.

I liked pieces of this book and I disliked parts of this book. It took me a little while to get through, since I only had a couple hours at most each day to read, and maybe that got in the way a little of being able to fully enjoy this. It just felt like there wasn\’t much progress and I had a hard time connecting with the characters. I\’m still not a huge fan of Rhine as a character. Once she breaks free of the mansion, it becomes a focus of her thoughts, and she even refuses to take off her wedding ring; the last major thing tying her to the marriage with Linden. Where her quiet resistance in the first book made sense, in Fever, I kept wanting her to fight. To dig deep and find a way to fight for what she wants, to know she made the right decision in leaving and bringing Gabriel with her. It never happened and while a possible explanation entered near the end of the book, I\’m not sold and I really hope DeStefano can make me believe it in the next book. Gabriel still doesn\’t interest me. In Wither, he was hardly around enough to form a real connection with. In Fever, he\’s around more, but half the time he\’s drugged and not himself, a quarter of the time either he or Rhine is sleeping and that last quarter is what he really is. I\’m sure a lot of people are completely in love with him, and I see his potential, but he\’s just not there. I haven\’t seen enough of him as him to really feel the romance between him and Rhine. The other thing that left me feeling disappointed was the plot. It felt like a lot of running and hiding, but there weren\’t any answers to questions. It felt a bit like running on a treadmill. You\’re doing something, but getting nowhere. Things happened, and I understand that they had to happen, but it just feels like it was a lot for nothing. And yet it somehow kept me interested and the ending has me ready to read the next book. What I really loved about this book, though, were the secondary characters, especially Maddie. I fell in love with her hard this book. Lilac, Jared, Silas, and Claire were wonderful additions to the story and I found myself wanting to read more about them than I did Rhine and Gabriel. They were different and extremely wonderful to read. Fever had as much potential to be a great story as Wither, but it fell a little short. It\’s still an interesting story, but I wish there was a little bit more to Rhine and Gabriel. There\’s enough to the book to keep me reading, and I hope DeStefano can write a conclusion that blows me out of the water.

I had a really hard time mucking through this second book which was disappointing because the first was so interesting. The book becomes stagnate several times. The first time was during the whole carnival/circus angle that seemed to only serve as a mechanism to bring in a new character or two. It should have been edited down a lot more. The whole drugged out thing for days seemed endless. The second time the story slowed was at the arrival at the orphanage which doesn\’t tie into the story as neatly as it is suppose to (I\’m assuming) other than to link it to the new character introduced at the circus. The bottom line is…we get that Rhine is the key to something important but the tedious depiction of her in and out of some daze as she\’s dealing with symptoms of an unknown illness becomes monotonous. Her interaction with the other characters needed to be more involved rather than just giving the reader a lot of inner dialogue. This would have given some depth, some meat, if you will, to her character so that a stronger connection can develop between her character and the other characters AND the reader. The character comes dangerously close to losing the investment she needs from the reader. The cliffhanger offers a glimpse of promised excitement into the third book but I\’m now hesitant to buy. I gave this two stars instead of one because the first book was interesting and the third book MAY offer answers that will give insight into why things were so dragged out in this book. If so, it was a big gamble that may not pay off if readers decide not to continue with the third book. I am rooting for the author to pull it all together in the third book and prove this review to be irrelevant. I will read the sample of the third book, hopefully I\’ll be drawn in enough to give it another chance.

Fever is the second book in the Chemical Garden trilogy and whilst I enjoyed the first book, Wither, slightly more than this one, it was still a great read. The series is about a dystopian world where the men only live to 25 and the women 20, so they\’re forced to breed early in order to keep the population alive. Rhine is the main character and in the first book, she is captured and sold to a wealthy family to marry Linden and become one of his many wives. The second book follows on from this storyline, but going into more details would spoil the first book. I liked this book slightly less than the first, but I can\’t place why. Up until around three-quarters of the way through, my interest wasn\’t held that well, but I\’m dedicated to finishing the series so I pushed on. At the end, I was hooked again. The ending was tense and I can\’t wait to start the third book to find out what happens. I would highly recommend starting this series.

Rhine Ellery has escaped her forced polygamous marriage along with Gabriel, a servant. In her desperation to escape her gilded cage, Rhine has forgotten a lot about the real world and runs straight into a trap in the form of a strange run-down carnival. Desperate to reach her brother in Manhattan, Rhine and Gabriel struggle to free themselves but with Rhine\’s sinister father-in-law Housemaster Vaughn determined to recapture her will they be able to escape again. This is the second book in the Chemical Garden trilogy (after Wither ) and a book I was eagerly anticipating given my enjoyment of the previous installment. Now away from the mansion Rhine and Gabriel are on their own and the book has a great feel of danger as the realities of the world set in. Gabriel\’s reactions in particular are fascinating as all he has ever known has been an orphanage and the mansion, and Rhine never prepared him for the brutalities of the world. The book is very much about Rhine and Gabriel\’s journey to New York and so it twists and turns as they travel and come into contact with other people. That said there were a few plot twists that didn\’t make any sense, particularly those of Madame and her decisions about what to do with Rhine. It\’s hard to discuss without spoilers but one day work was done only for a decision to make said work pointless which seemed unusually wasteful for her character. I was expecting Rhine and Gabriel\’s romance to develop more in this book away from the influence of Linden, but it seems that reaches beyond his physical presence. Rhine seems to have lost her perspective on her marriage, remembering Linden quite fondly rather than as the man who married her against her will and some of her decisions are pretty dumb. Gabriel really starts to come out of his shell and develop as a character, keeping Rhine safe while struggling to accept the realities of the world. I loved some of the new characters that were introduced, especially Maddie. Maddie is a disabled child who Rhine and Gabriel encounter on their travels and I was impressed as how sympathetically and realistically her disabilities were presented. She\’s a really sweet kid to boot and so adds a new dimension to the story whilst replacing Cecily as the dependent character. All in all this was a great read and I\’m looking forward to the final volume Sever . Plot: 9/10 Characters: 9/10 Ending: 9/10 Enjoyment: 10/10 Cover: 8/10 Overall: 45/50

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