Becky's View: Lucid by P.T. Michelle

Lucid by P.T. Michelle
♦ self-published
♦ release date: July 9th, 2012
♦ ebook, 272 pages
♦ intended audience: Young adult
♦ series: Brightest Kind of Darkness, book 2
   (review of book 1)
*Spoiler alert! Description and review may contain spoilers for book 1 in the series!*

Once Nara combines her prophetic ability with Ethan’s power to outsmart Fate at his own deadly cat-and-mouse game, she’s more determined than ever to help Ethan learn the meaning behind the raven sword tattoo that suddenly appeared on his back after their confrontation with Fate.

During her quest to uncover the tattoo’s secrets, Nara enlists the help of some new friends and discovers her own surprising connection to Ethan.

While Nara digs deeper into the mystery, her desire for answers leads her down a dangerous path full of powerful and ruthless enemies. Swept into an age-old battle, Nara quickly learns that keeping one’s enemies close can be a necessary evil, making an intangible enemy she can control far more preferable to the human enemies she can’t.

Review: With Lucid, this series continues it's awesomeness.  Brightest Kind of Darkness was easily one of my favorite reads last year, and while Lucid left me a little less starry eyed, it was still a fantastic, exciting read.  

Lucid really had a very different feel from BKoD, mainly because Ethan is hardly present in it at all. It takes place shortly after book one left off, and Ethan is gone for most of the book to try and rebuild a relationship with this parents.  I thought this might bother me at first, but I actually loved how the connection between him and Nara and the ravens came a little more to light because he was gone. Plus, it gave us a chance to see Nara stand on her own two feet and grow as her own character---and for her to have a chance to let some new people into her life.  And when I say new people, I mean Drystan---lovely Welsh, kick-ass parkour-doing, all around good guy with a few interesting secrets of his own.  I love watching parkour, so to see it incorporated into a story and used as a cool kind of self-defense added a really unique touch to this story.  For those of you dreading that this will spin into a love triangle, have no fear.  I think we're safe there.  He makes a good friend to Nara, there's a great connection there.  I hope he has a part in book 3 because I can't wait to hear more about his background and his part in all of it.  

As for the parts where Ethan does make an appearance, things get pretty steamy. :)  But he was also a little too intense and possessive and it turned me off from him a bit. It sounds like he's been through a lot and learned a great deal while he was away, so I can't wait to find out more about what he's uncovered about his powers and his connection to Nara.  I loved all the raven-lore we get to read about while Nara is frantically researching to find an answer to their mystery.  She finds a raven sanctuary and what happens on her first visit there is absolutely magical.  There are some serious baddies after Nara and her raven research, but what they're after and why is a mystery that has yet to be unraveled in the next installment.  We also get a lot more insight into what happened with Nara's dad.  Lucid leaves us with a bit of surprise twist, a bit of a cliffhanger, and a few more questions, so now I'm eagerly anticipating book 3!

So, I do have one small negative---and really, it may just be me and my own bizarre idiosyncrasies on this one.  In my own crazy reading quirks, there is one writing mishap that trips me up every time.  It's when one phrase is used too many times.  I'm not going to say what phrase it was, because I don't want anyone else to catch on to it if it doesn't bother them (kind of like when someone points out a flaw in a picture that you never noticed, and from then on that's all you notice. )  However, for my review, it was worth mentioning because it completely distracted me every time it came up, even enough to momentarily pull my mind out of the story. 

Aside from that, an awesome sequel that left me with enough questions to start craving the third installment!! I also can't wait for the third book's cover reveal---the first two have been gorgeous!

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Purchase Lucid at: Amazon  •  BN.com   •  Smashwords

(coming soon to paperback, too!)