Alma Katsu

A follow-up to The Taker follows the experiences of immortal woman Lanny, whose obsessive desires compel her to risk everything and influence the destinies of Luke, Adair and Jonathan.

Book Two of the Taker Trilogy

The Reckoning

Anna Ureta

May contain minor spoilers.
 Which will be marked. 

I’ve just got to say that the follow-up to The Taker is everything I expected it to be. I was a little bit afraid that this book wouldn’t live up to my expectations. Seeing as The Taker is ONE OF MY FAVOURITE BOOKS OF ALL TIME I was afraid that the sequel wouldn’t be as good – like most movies. But books have a way of surprising you and this one definitely did. It had everything I loved about The Taker and more. Love, betrayal, magic, but it also had a little bit more. It turned what was once a monster, into something a little more human.
 
In the words of Jim Moriarty from BBC’s Sherlock… “Did you miss me?”
 Adair is BACK! and he’s got a thirst for vengeance. After two hundred years of being stuck behind a wall in the dark you start to go a little mental. Now that Adair is free from his prison the only thing on his mind is getting revenge on the one that put him there in the first place. Lanore.
 
While safely tucked away in Paris with Luke, Lanore feels a presence she hasn’t felt in centuries. Scared for her life that the man who bestowed her the gift of immortality is going to make her his prisoner and slave, Lanny does the first thing that comes to mind. She runs. She runs in the hopes of finding a way out of this hellish nightmare, leaving poor Luke behind to wonder where she’s gone.
 
So at first I was like…
 “This is alright…”
 Then I was like…
 “Pretty good, pretty good.”
 Then I was like,
 “I CAN’T STOP READING!!! MY EYES!!!!”
 And finall-
 “THIS BOOK IS FREAKING AMAZING!!!!! AHHHHHHH!!!!! ALL THE FEELS!!!!!!”
 
I mean I haven’t read The Fault in Our Stars yet and I know that book is going to be a tear-jerking, waterfall, ugly crying book, but this book, THIS BOOK was just, as corny as it may sound, is a much more BEAUTIFUL and MODERN LOVE STORY that parallels that of Beauty and the Beast.
 
Told through several POV’s, Katsu’s books never fail to deliver interesting narratives while flawlessly captivating readers attention. With Lanny’s POV it’s her helplessness and fear of Adair that drives her. With Adair it’s his naiveté of the new and modern world, how everything is strange to him and how he must reclaim everything that he’s lost. With Luke, there’s this desire, this need, to be with Lanore because she holds what he believes is the answer to the universe… or something poetic like that which I think is so sweet.
 
Let’s look at Adair some more. OMG I LOVE HIM~!
 
Never thought I’d say this but I think he’s made my list of Fictional Boyfriends <3. It’s not just the badass looks, tattoos or amazing sex that makes a Fictional Boyfriend, or one that makes my list. It’s the drive, the desire, the love, and how far they’re willing to go, how much they’re willing to sacrifice for the one they love. That’s what gets me.
 
SPOILER… the more I read Adair’s narrative the more I wanted his feelings for Lanore to be real. I WANT him to love her and I WANT her to love him back. I WANT IT SO BAD IT’S KILLING ME!!! But it’s never that easy, nothing ever is. Considering everything he’s done and the person he used to be. In her eyes he’s a monster, a terrible person, the scum of the earth! and yet somehow there’s part of him that’s come to love her, even though she trapped him behind a wall for 200 years. He’s so DESPERATE for her love and affection and you see it in the way he tortures himself! fighting these feelings…I just really want them to have a happy ending… But like I said, I doubt it’d be that easy. END SPOILER…
 
Inside, he detected a scent that he associated with Lanore, her must making a part of his brain fire excitedly, re-creating the feeling of being in her presence. She felt so real, so present, that he expected her to walk around a corner or to hear her voice carry down the staircase, and when neither happened, he felt his loneliness more profoundly than before. Coming here, where he could feel her presence again, proved to him that he had changed – he was now susceptible to loneliness and sadness.
 
Getting into the storytelling, what I love about The Taker and The Reckoning is the flawless way Katsu incorporates flashbacks into the story. It doesn’t feel forced or anything like that, but is just so well-integrated that it adds to the story. They really give a better insight to the characters, especially since they’ve lived for hundreds of years, and they do answer A LOT of unanswered questions we had from The Taker which I really liked. I was afraid there wouldn’t be any flashbacks in this book; I’m glad to have been proven wrong.
 
One thing that I absolute love and fully applaud Katsu for her creative use and integration of alchemy in the series. More to the point, the Elixir of Life. One of the most elusive and infamous pieces in any alchemy tale. Immortality as in every alchemist’s tale comes at a price, and the elixir of life is no exception. But with this story Katsu has created something that is equally beautiful as it is sad in the ways which one overcomes the burden of being immortal. *Read The Taker to find out what it is 

“Compassion? Why would a man who cannot die – possibly the most powerful man on earth – require anyone’s compassion?” Adair scoffed.
 “Yes, compassion. For the day when a man says immortality is too much and asks for the cup to be taken away, for it is too full.”
 
What really gets me about this book and this series, apart from the characters, narrative, storyline, and flashbacks is that there aren’t any unanswered questions from The Taker, and yes I know I mentioned it before but I can’t stress HOW IMPORTANT the flashbacks are. Everything I was wondering about gets answered, and then some. The story isn’t just their life moving forward and what they do with their immortal selves, it’s allowing the reader to discover the past and what life choices and paths they chose that made them who they are today. I find the story to be a lot more complicated than it actually seems, and the more I read the more fascinated I become! The fact that Adair is starting to GROW ON ME is pretty freaking scary. I’m scared. And that’s something.
 
Despite the regret in Jonathan’s voice, Adair was struck by the selfishness of his act, to ask someone who loved him dearly to end his life. What had compelled her to agree? Was it because of her boundless love for him, or her guilt for having made him immortal against his will? In either case, it was an unnatural position to be put in, and still she had not denied him.
 
I am SO HAPPY I waited this long to read The Reckoning because now I get to enjoy The Descent right after and I’ve been waiting for this book for quite some time!!! The Taker series is by far one of the most enjoyable series I’ve EVER had the pleasure to read, and if you haven’t read it YOU DEFINITELY SHOULD! I hope after this series ends that Katsu continues to write because I CAN’T TELL YOU how much I enjoy her books and her way of storytelling, it really is one of a kind.
 
6/5 Hearts of Love

Read more of my reviews at http://www.akiikomorireading.com

The Reckoning Book Two of the Taker Trilogy

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