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A review by garnetofeden
Haunted by Kelley Armstrong
4.0
In a thrilling supernatural detective story, Haunted explores a completely different aspect of the Otherworld universe – the afterlife – and presents our most fascinatingly morally-gray point-of-view character yet - Eve Levine.
Eve died off-page before readers even knew about her existence in Stolen, but she has still had a reverberating influence in the lives of our Otherworld characters, particularly Paige and Savannah. Her shade finally made an in-person appearance in Industrial Magic, where Eve agreed to owe the Fates a favor if they sent Lucas back to the real world with Paige. When Haunted picks up, it’s been 18 months since Eve made that deal, and the Fates are about to call in their chit.
The Fates send Eve after a Nix, an unusual escapee from an afterlife prison, hoping that Eve’s more flexible view of morality might finally do the trick for a successful recapture. While the Nixen are usually limited to lending humans the resolve to perform tasks like murder, this particular Nixen figures out in the Prologue how to cross the line to possession. One of my favorite parts of this book is how Eve’s perspective is interspersed with that of the Nix, taking us on a fictionalized tour through the headspace of some of history’s most famous murderesses. Even though Eve is in her afterlife, she still experiences personal growth throughout the book.
While I’m still curious about some of the questions we don’t get answers to, this is the book that most solidly hooked me on the Otherworld series during my first readthrough. Since it’s a new point-of-view character and taking place in the universe’s afterlife, I think that it satisfactorily provides enough background in text that it can be read as a standalone novel, but I think it will be most enjoyed in its place in the overall Otherworld universe timeline.
Rating reviewed 1/20/2023.
Eve died off-page before readers even knew about her existence in Stolen, but she has still had a reverberating influence in the lives of our Otherworld characters, particularly Paige and Savannah. Her shade finally made an in-person appearance in Industrial Magic, where Eve agreed to owe the Fates a favor if they sent Lucas back to the real world with Paige. When Haunted picks up, it’s been 18 months since Eve made that deal, and the Fates are about to call in their chit.
The Fates send Eve after a Nix, an unusual escapee from an afterlife prison, hoping that Eve’s more flexible view of morality might finally do the trick for a successful recapture. While the Nixen are usually limited to lending humans the resolve to perform tasks like murder, this particular Nixen figures out in the Prologue how to cross the line to possession. One of my favorite parts of this book is how Eve’s perspective is interspersed with that of the Nix, taking us on a fictionalized tour through the headspace of some of history’s most famous murderesses. Even though Eve is in her afterlife, she still experiences personal growth throughout the book.
While I’m still curious about some of the questions we don’t get answers to
Spoiler
(like what did the Nix say to convince Jaime that she was Eve?)Rating reviewed 1/20/2023.