Publisher: Orion
Pages: 688pgs
The Story
THE EPIC STORY OF THE PASSAGE CONTINUES
At the end of The Passage, the great viral plague had left a small group of survivors clinging to life amidst a world transformed into a nightmare. In the second volume of this epic trilogy, this same group of survivors, led by the mysterious, charismatic Amy, go on the attack, leading an insurrection against the virals: the first offensives of the Second Viral War.To do this, they must infiltrate a dozen hives, each presided over by one of the original Twelve. Their secret weapon: Alicia, transformed at the end of book one into a half human, half viral—but whose side, in the end, is she really on?
The Review
For those who have read my review for Justin Cronin's The Passage last year, you would know how much I love this author and of his unique, bleak tale. So you can only imagine my own excitement when I received my copy of the sequel, THE TWELVE, because I couldn't wait to find out what was going to happen to some of my favourite characters - including my favourite girl, Amy. But after reading the book, while certain parts of it certainly answered a lot of my questions from the previous book, but unfortunately my love of the first book was not shared with this sequel. At least not on a grand epic scale this time round.
THE TWELVE was quite a mouthful. I mean, The Passage, the first installment of the series, was quite a mouthful as well (like a lot of readers have already pointed out), but unlike the sequel I found the first book flowed much more easily and beautifully at that, which made me enjoy every second of it. So while I still love this sequel, especially with Justin Cronin's imaginative - but very bleak - world and the overall tale the author is telling us that is still so cryptic and exciting, however I did get confused and quite a bit bored by the amount of perspectives we receive in this particular book. Some more unnecessary than others. I guess I just wanted more from my favourite characters, Amy and Peter, whom I was more interested in than any other character we've been introduced to lately. I just felt like those two characters in particular had so much more to offer, especially Amy who is the center of all of this world.
Despite the very long book that dragged on now and again, the ending was definitely worth it. An ending that features Amy and another beloved character of mine, Wolgast, who looked after Amy from the first book, The Passage. Wolgast was like a father figure to our unusual and mysterious Amy, and while his story comes to an end in this sequel, but my god the ending was so sad and yet so incredibly empowering not to mention wonderful. Gosh . . . Amy and Wolgast bring out all sorts of emotions in me when I read them together on the page. I'm going to really miss you Wolgast. I'm really going to miss you.
Overall, while I had a lack of a connection to THE TWELVE compared to The Passage, but I'm still looking forward to reading the third and final book in the series next year. I just hope there is more Amy and Peter scenes, because no matter how you look at it, I always ship them together and yet they have very small scenes together . . . so please bring me some more of them!
The Rating
3/5 stars
This second book in the series was not quite as spell-binding as the first book, The Passage. Still good reading.
ReplyDeleteRowena Hailey (SEO in Kent)
Exactly. It wasn't as good as the first, but still a good read for the most part. :D
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