Review: Passion

Passion by Lauren Kate

publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers

release date: June 14th, 2011

hardcover, 420 pages

intended audience: Young adult

previous books in series:
• Fallen (review)
• Torment (review)

rating:


source: from publisher for honest review

Warning!! Description and review may contain spoilers for Fallen or Torment!! If you haven't started this series, stop reading now! :)

description:
"Every single lifetime, I'll choose you. Just as you have chosen me. Forever."

Luce would die for Daniel. And she has. Over and over again. Throughout time, Luce and Daniel have found each other, only to be painfully torn apart: Luce dead, Daniel left broken and alone. But perhaps it doesn’t need to be that way. . . .

Luce is certain that something—or someone—in a past life can help her in her present one. So she begins the most important journey of this lifetime . . . going back eternities to witness firsthand her romances with Daniel . . . and finally unlock the key to making their love last.

Cam and the legions of angels and Outcasts are desperate to catch Luce, but none are as frantic as Daniel. He chases Luce through their shared pasts, terrified of what might happen if she rewrites history.

Because their romance for the ages could go up in flames . . . forever.

Review: Throughout the great wide book-reviewing blogosphere, I see readers who love this series and people who...don't. It's just one of those things. Me...I don't know if I can pin-point the exact reason...but I absolutely adore this series. And with this latest installment, it has only gotten better.

Passion is this expansive, breathtaking race through five thousand years of Luce's reincarnations as she is desperately trying to find the answers she needs: what is the reason for her and Daniel's curse? Is there a way to break the curse? And most importantly, whether or not their love is real or just some torturous trap they are compelled to fall into lifetime after lifetime. She jumps from time to time, witnessing their love and her death over and over, trying to understand what it all means. It was fascinating to see who she was in each lifetime and how Daniel found her each time. We're swept along through Russia, Italy, France, England, Tahiti, Egypt...so many places and each one felt like it's own fascinating mini-story. I can't help but try to imagine the insane amount of research that went into making each time and place come to life. It's fast-paced all the way through, the tension builds just perfectly, leading up to an completely explosive ending! I can tell already that the next book is going to be intense and very exciting!

All my favorite characters are there again---Daniel, of course, as he chases Luce through their past lives; we get to see Cam periodically and understand him a little better. Luce's character has evolved so much from the first book, she's much stronger and determined to take the whole curse situation into her own hands. Arriane, Roland, Gabbe...we get to see them only briefly but its fun to run across their characters in different time periods. There is the addition of a new character, a gargoyle named Bill. He is a sort of guide that Luce runs into inside her announcer (for those who don't remember, the "announcers" are the shadowy portals to other times and places). He plays a very big part in the whole story. It's funny but when he was first introduced I couldn't stop thinking of him as a "jiminy cricket"-type character, even so much that when he spoke I heard a very jiminy-like voice. :)

For those of my fellow readers who love this story like I do---I hope you are as completely blown away as I was by Passion!! For those of you who haven't tried this series out yet, I highly recommend it!

Visit Lauren Kate's site here.

Purchase Passion at: Amazon • BN.com • BookDepository • Indiebound

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