The Lovely and The Lost by Page Morgan Series: The Dispossessed #2
Published by Delacorte Books for Young Readers on May 13, 2014
Format: ARC
Source: Netgalley
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Purchase Links: Amazon | B&N
I REALLY HATE to admit this, but……..
TheLovelyandTheLostisEVENBETTERthanTheBeautifulandTheCursed!!$!!#!
THIS. BOOK. Ohmawgawd.
Okay, calming myself down now. Time to review like the civilized bibliophile that I am. *coughs*
You can check out my review of TB&TC (The Dispossessed #1) and Marco’s Story (The Dispossessed #.5) here and here. This review will be SPOILER FREE for those who have not been lucky enough to read The Beautiful and The Cursed yet.
I’m glad I read The Lovely and The Lost in digital format. Had I had the physical book, I might have started making out with it. This sequel to TB&TC was HOT.
I found myself using the book mark option on my Kindle like an exclamation mark. I would tap it over and over because highlighting and one digital blue book mark wasn’t enough for some of the literary strokes of genius and moments of Victorian passion Page Morgan delivers in this book. The Lovely and The Lost is now on my Top 5 Books of the Year list.
Page Morgan really knows how to work an ensemble cast. In most books with an ensemble cast of characters I’m usually waiting for the main characters to show back up and I read through the shenanegins and thoughts of the secondary folk with a hint of annoyance. That is NOT the case with The Dispossessed series. I’m friggin’ in love with ALL of the characters and am wholeheartedly entertained by each of their stories.
Menacing scenes of demonic action set against a stoney and darkly-dreamy Paris is a creepy-cool effect that Page Morgan uses to both woo the bad-ass in me and scare the devil out of me. The intrigue, the action, the romance, the wit- all of it mixed together so well and there was never a dull moment.
Ingrid and Luc face new challenges in TL&TL since the rocky turn of events at the end of TB&TC. There should be a new word invented to describe how awesome the confused and romantic tension that builds between them throughout the novel is. Throw in another mysterious gargoyle that Luc might have to share Ingrid with and things get even more intense.
Luc let go of her only to take her shoulders this time. His strength didn’t surprise her, but the way he pressed her shoulders together did. There was passion in it. Urgency in the downward slant of his brow, his pale lime eyes lit as if from within.
“I am your gargoyle,” he whispered, his breath sweet and warm against her lips. […]
Especially when you throw a smart and sexy Vander Burke, a fellow ”duster” like Ingrid into the mix. Sparks are flying everywhere and oh, how I wanted to be caught on fire. Page Morgan didn’t let me down.
“I mean it. I feel an electricity whenever we touch,” he said, stepping closer, leaving an inch, maybe two, between them. Ingrid already felt hot, and when Vander reached up to run his thumb across her lower lip, she thought she might combust.
“Do you feel anything now?” he asked. Before she could answer, Vander had his lips against hers.
To make matters worse for my poor, racing pulse, Gabby, Ingrid’s younger sister, and Nolan, an Alliance member, engage in a fun and completely seductive courtship. Discreetly enough to be bursting at the seems in the way only a Victorian romance can do.
And, oh, God- Nolan’s accent and, and…just the words that come out of his mouth-YES. I can’t even fully express how much I enjoyed Gabby and Nolan’s exchanges in this book. Let this suffice: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nolan leaned his forehead against hers and sighed. “My da’s decision is final, so no, lass, you can’t join the Alliance. Noy yet.”
He rubbed his nose against the tip of hers. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t keep learning how to fight. If it’s done between us, in private, there’s no reason anyone else has to know.” Gabby liked how that sounded. She brought her mouth to his, kissing him first this time. She felt Nolan’s lips stretch into a smile. He captured her bottom lip with a soft nip of his teeth.
I was pleasantly surprised to see Grayson’s, Ingrid and Gabby’s brother, part expand in TL&TL. After the first book in The Dispossessed series, I was on the fence about the quality and integrity of his character, but like the masterful writer she is, Page Morgan completely keeps me guessing about him. One minute he’s a savior and the next he’s self-serving. I could appreciate the struggle Grayson mentally endures while trying to balance the side of himself that is good and the side of himself that is drawn to the darkness in his blood.
So, if you couldn’t already tell, this book turned me into a blathering fan girl. I really enjoyed this sequel to TB&TC and I think it is positively wicked that I have to wait another year for the next book to come out. Every scene, every turn of events, every paragraph of dialogue kept me mentally engaged. Sometimes I didn’t know if a love-triangle was being developed or a love-quartet between certain characters. I was constantly kept guessing about the intentions of a few gargoyles. Page Morgan coyly planted seeds of ideas about an array of possible outcomes in the next Dispossessed novel. You can check out Page Morgan’s Pinterest page here to see more image boards for the settings and characters in The Dispossessed series.
If you have read and enjoyed this series and are dying for something to hold you over until the next book comes out, I suggest reading C.J. Archer’s Freak House series. It’s set in the same time period and has a very similar feel to The Dispossessed. You can find my reviews for The Freak House series here.
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