I have decided to take the plunge and read the whole Raven Cycle series since I haven’t done a good submersion into a series in a while.
Stiefvater’s beautiful prose does not disappoint in volume 2, The Dream Thieves. I am absolutely in love with this woman’s craft. Her brilliant syntax and poetic descriptions are at times so perfect and poignant, it hurts. It literally makes me think about her book whenever I’m not reading it. I blew through this volume in about 2 days because I didn’t want to stop reading her gorgeous prose. I also love the constant push-pull she has with Gansey and his wealth. I love that she’s captured a character who should be so flat and surface, and she’s not only made him deep and compelling, but sympathetic and the only wealthy character in my reading history who I might want to hang out with, red Camero and all.
As she continues to build on her characters, I was taken with the realness in which she surrounds her main five. Adam’s issues with his anger and continuing to struggle on his own come to a head in this volume, along with Ronan’s character unfolding from dangerous emo dude to a well-rounded and nuanced teenager. Gansey and Blue remain themselves, and I appreciated their solid sameness amidst the turmoil of the rest of their group. Stiefvater’s ability to include the tropey love triangle and make it fresh and almost backstage to the story she’s really telling was also masterful. Yes, the triangle fulfills in the way we want it to, but it doesn’t detract or distract from the dark beauty and deep issues she’s tackling in the rest of the plot.
My only complaint about this volume was Kavinsky; and not because he was a poorly done character, but because I didn’t think there was enough of him. He just sort of popped up into the plot conveniently and popped out just as conveniently. He did his plot duty, but I would have liked for him to have appeared maybe just a little bit more in the first novel (I think he’s mentioned once or twice, but not with any real detail) so we were better prepared for him to be the flagrantly explosive presence that he is.
All in all, a gorgeous book, and I’m waiting for the Library snail to drive the 3rd installment from the far reaches of our lending libraries system.
4 stars.