Fablehaven - Book 3
Fablehaven: Grip of the Shadow Plagueby Brandon MullWell, the third book in the Fablehaven series did not let me down. I will admit to having my doubts when I first started it, though that soon changed for the better once I got a few chapters in.Kendra and Seth are still at Fablehaven and due to the evil Society of the Evening Star still being after Kendra and the hidden artifacts, their grandparents have been making excuses for them to stay longer. School is starting soon and their parents are anxious to get them home. Something evil is turning the magical creatures of Fablehaven dark. Not fallen, but dark and this plague is quickly spreading through the preserve. Even some of the humans get infected, though the effect is a little different for them.For the first part of the story Kendra and Seth are apart, each with their own storyline - Kendra was off with the Knights of the Dawn trying to rescue one of the hidden artifacts and Seth is dealing with the plague back at Fablehaven. That was perfectly fine with me, because I had thought I would just skip over the Seth chapters, because, you know.. Seth.Speaking of the annoyance that is Seth, I had completely forgotten about him until I started reading the book and suddenly my thought process was this, "Oh. Right. Seth." *sigh* BUT I am happy to report that although things started out with me thinking I wanted to smack him upside the head, he turned out to be a) not irritating and b) a help and actually the smart one for some parts.We get introduced the the existence of dragons in this book and I figured when they mentioned them that this would be fodder for another book - sure enough the fourth book is called Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary. Heh. I can spot a plot device a mile away - and a cliffhanger, too!I actually enjoyed the multiple plot-lines, even though they end up sort of meshing by the middle of the book so it wasn't too confusing to switch from one to the other with each chapter. This story was quite action packed and suspenseful. It's pretty obvious by the end of the book that there will be another one, because things are far from resolved. Though it's not quite an edge-of-your-seat cliffhanger like many other series out there (the Morganville Vampires series springs to mind here). I am once more irritated that I have to wait a year for the next book as for some reason they are published in hard cover first. I know if I was in the 9-12 age bracket I wouldn't be buying hard covers. Ah, well, different generation I guess.Fablehaven Series
- Fablehaven
- Fablehaven: Rise of the Evening Star
- Fablehaven: Grip of the Shadow Plague
- Fablehaven: Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary
- Fablehaven: Keys to the Demon Prison - out now in hard cover!
* I edited the date on this post, as I actually finished the book on May 31 and I would like to have this post count as a book read in May!** I had another sort of PS to add and now I don't remember. Bah. I think it might have had to do with the fact that I took lunch at my desk at work today just so I could write and post this review - I enjoyed the book so much and finished it late in the night last night - but BEFORE midnight. So it counts for May! HA!