LainieLibrary's Reviews > Nightshade

3 Stars

When I try to gather my thoughts about this book I'm quite torn. On one hand I enjoyed the story, but on the other the story was a bit confusing/hard to follow and I'm not sure how I feel about the ending. I'm going to stick this at 3 stars for now.

This book is about Farryn and Jericho (present day), but we also have chapters following another couple, Lustina and the young baron (hundreds of years ago). Farryn is a young women living in Chicago. Her mother died years ago, which triggered her father's obsession with figuring out what happened to her. I believe they were unable to find her mother's body, which took her father down a rabbit hole of trying to find her. Farryn's father committed suicide years after that, and again no body was recovered. He had gone insane - ranting about Nightshade, angels and demons those last few years of his life. Farryn then lived with her aunt up until her aunt also passed away. Farryn starts to get pulled into the world her father had ranted about when she starts having odd dreams to "find Van Croix in Nighshade". Then a police officer comes to inquire about a grisly murder that had occurred, which appears to be connected to her father's "research". A strong force is pulling Farryn to investigate what her father left behind and to find a way to this Nightshade he spoke of. Her time on earth is becoming more perilous, as someone appears to be hunting her, so she decides she must find way into Nightshade. Once Farryn makes it to the Nightshade she finds more questions than answers, and her path crosses with Jericho Van Croix.

We have four POVs, Farryn, Lustina, Jericho, and the young baron (with dual timelines). It's a lot going on, and took some effort to sort out the huge cast of characters. I almost put this down a few times at the very beginning, but I'm happy I stuck with it. Overall the pacing was pretty good, I enjoyed Farryn and Jericho quite a bit, the steamy parts were good and the plot was interesting. There was certainly a lot of intrigue.

Unfortunately, I think I disliked more than I enjoyed. There was a lot of confusion due to not only the large cast of characters, but also because SO much was happening with the plot. There were so many facets and connections throughout the plot, which I did love to an extent, but it became exhausting and really hard to keep track of. And honestly, think there were some holes and connections that didn't make sense. Everything was so interconnected it quickly became messy. At some points I felt like the plot almost overshadowed the connection and emotion built up between Jericho and Farryn. At certain points I wished their relationship and development was actually delved into a bit more.

I'm not even sure how I feel about the ending. It sounds like there will be another book in this series, but I'm wondering... why? I guess I don't see the need to extend this, unless it's going to follow new characters entirely, (view spoiler)[like Farryn/Jericho's daughter carrying the curse. (hide spoiler)] I may read it since I do love Keri Lake, but TBD.