devannm 's review for:

Slashback by Rob Thurman
5.0
He touched my little brother—I stopped his heart. It was a fair trade. - Niko

It didn’t matter if you were from Above or Below or somewhere in the middle; you touched my brother and you died. - Cal

This is probably my favorite book in the whole series, and I'm sure it's not a coincidence that it's arguably the most angsty as well. I mean Cal is always fairly angsty, but the entire plot of this book is built around mirroring a time when each of the brothers got kidnapped and they are blaming themselves for not being able to keep the other one safe so the angst levels really have some room to soar to new heights. I always like when Cal's POV is intercut with someone else's, and in this book I really love all the parallels she draws between what happened when they were kids and what is happening the present day. Also, as always, the more Auphe Cal is the happier I am and he is definitely losing his grip in the best way in this book.

This is also the book where Rob throws in the infamous
Spoilerpast lives
curveball despite it being blatantly obvious that she in no way planned for it early in the series. I do have my issues with it, mainly
Spoilerthat it further sidelines Promise by making Cal, Niko, and Robin into this reincarnation boy's club thing and also that Rob pulls the whole Achilles and Patroclus were 'cousins' thing because apparently she thinks her readers are ok with all the other fucked up shit in her books but her main characters who are now brothers being lovers in a previous life would be too much
. Still, it is an interesting development that brings up all kinds of new possibilities [that she unfortunately didn't really get to explore]. Definitely a nice stop-gap before they face off against Grimm again in the next book.