Pretty Little Pages: Series Review: The Darkest Powers by Kelley Armstrong

The Darkest Powers Trilogy:

The Summoning, The Awakening, The Reckoning by Kelley Armstrong

Rating: 5/5

Genres: Young Adult, Urban Fantasy, Paranormal

Blurbs:

My name is Chloe Saunders and my life will never be the same again.

All I wanted was to make friends, meet boys, and keep on being ordinary. I don't even know what that means anymore. It all started on the day that I saw my first ghost - and the ghost saw me.

Now there are ghosts everywhere and they won't leave me alone. To top it all off, I somehow got myself locked up in Lyle House, a "special home" for troubled teens. Yet the home isn't what it seems. Don't tell anyone, but I think there might be more to my housemates than meets the eye. The question is, whose side are they on? it's up to me to figure out the dangerous secrets behind Lyle House...before its skeletons come back to haunt me.

- The Summoning on Goodreads

Chloe Saunders is on the run and raising hell. Literally.

Chloe Saunders is not your average supernatural teenager. Genetically altered at birth by a sinister team of scientists, she can barely control her terrifying powers. Now the team that created her has decided it's time to end the experiment. Permanently.

Now Chloe is running for her life along with a charming sorcerer, a troubled werewolf and a temperamental young witch. Together they have a chance for freedom - but can Chloe trust her new friends?

- The Awakening on Goodreads

Chloe Saunders is fifteen and would love to be normal. Unfortunately, Chloe happens to be a genetically engineered necromancer who can raise the dead without even trying. She and her equally gifted (or should that be 'cursed'?) friends are now running for their lives from the evil corporation that created them.

As if that's not enough, Chloe is struggling with her feelings for Simon, a sweet-tempered sorcerer, and his brother Derek, a not so sweet-tempered werewolf. And she has a horrible feeling she's leaning towards the werewolf...

Definitely not normal.

- The Reckoning on Goodreads

Review:

The Darkest Powers Trilogy follows the story of Chloe Saunders, a genetically modified and enhanced teenage necromancer. It begins with her admittance into Lyle House, a home for teens plagued by mental condition or so it seems. It's here that we meet most of the characters that interlace through the rest of the series. Derek, a werewolf, and his brother Simon, a sorcerer, are residents of the facility and important characters as the story progresses. Rachelle, Liz, and Tori are, also, residents of Lyle House. The trilogy goes on to follow their multiple escapes from the clutches of the Edison Group, the ones responsible for modifying the teens and placing them in Lyle House.

This story drags you in quickly and does not let you go. I remember whenever I first started The Summoning, I stayed up way too late to finish it. This trend continued for the next two books. Armstrong is a master at timing. Nothing ever felt rush, and I felt the plot stayed perfectly on pace. The main theme that stretched across the three books never felt diminished by the side plots. The introduction of the supernatural elements flowed well, and there was never an information dump that I dread in books involving supernatural/paranormal elements. Much of the information was kept on a need to know basis, and it added to the suspense.

At times, this story had me looking over my shoulder and biting my nails. The sense of urgency and even fear that Chloe feels is effortlessly delivered to the reader. She is a wonderful main character. There is nothing perfect about her. Regardless of the upheaval of life as she knows it, it is still easy to be inside her head and follow her thoughts. You can definitely watch her grow from timid teen to a determined young lady from the first page until the last in the series. The other characters are all well thought out. Armstrong devotes enough time to each one of them to give a clear picture of their reasoning and motives. Liz was a favorite of mine, and I enjoyed each time she would show up through the story. The villains in this series are the perfect bad guys. They're driven by power and drug into a world of madness. You will love to hate them.

Romance is a very, very minor theme in this story. But I think that Armstrong handles it perfectly. This is not a series about romance. It's a series about a teenage girl on the run from the people who damned her. The build up that finally comes to it's end in the final pages of the third book is what I was looking for. It's not overpowering. It's just enough to remind you that Chloe is a teenage girl who develops crushes just like any other. It makes her more real.

My only complaint with this series is the very ending of it. I feel like the ending of the third book was too rushed. There were quite a few unanswered questions left hanging in the air which always drives me crazy. There was enough material to carry on into a fourth book. I spent three books waiting for the romance that was slowly building to materialize. It did, but barely. I know this something small to pick at, but I wanted a lot more resolutions.

Overall, that single downfall didn't dismiss the story enough for me to turn my back on it. It's still one of my favorite series as of late. It's a great read that you will find yourself unable to put down if you're a fan of YA supernatural/paranormal series. I'm already seeking out the follow-up series to this one by Armstrong.

Dream Cast: