Book Review: Unleashed

Unleashed (Uninvited #2)

By: Sophie Jordan

Published By: HarperTeen

Publication Date: February 24, 2015

Page Count: 368

Buy it at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or IndieBound

Source: Purchased by Reviewer

Audience: Young Adult - Science Fiction 

Review of Book #1: Uninvited 

I felt a little let down by Unleashed. Uninvited was such a thrilling and thought provoking read that I was highly anticipating this sequel, and it didn't live up to my expectations sadly. I'm going to discuss Uninvited without restraint, so if you are worried about spoilers then please stop reading here for now! 

 I felt like Unleashed was a completely different story from Uninvited; Davy is in a very different place. She has accepted her HTS (Homicidal Tendency Syndrome) gene diagnosis, and after being forced to kill someone to save Sean, she feels beyond redemption and her feelings for Sean become entangled in this self loathing. So it wasn't entirely surprising after this development that Sean barely featured in the story - this will annoy some of you intensely! He is replaced by another equally fanciable book boyfriend, Caden, who displays an uncanny knack at saving Davy. The only problem is that Davy effectively tries to shut herself down and become a Davy-robot to shelter herself from the atrocities that she is forced to commit. I could absolutely sympathise with her for trying to shut off her feelings, but it didn't bond me to her struggles much so I found myself caring about her fate much less than I did in Uninvited. 

Davy has a lot to deal with emotionally in Unleashed too. She escapes death a lot, sometimes with worse injuries than others. She pushes herself through rehab to get fit rather relentlessly and struggles to make friends. I'm not really surprised because she is not that likable really. She also suffers from an excess of luck - despite her brushes with death she seems to always scrape through thanks to some fortunate person or object. I can think of a time when she was aimlessly wandering about in the desert looking for a hidden compound and ran right into the people she most needed while under threat of death. It was a little too convenient for my liking; perhaps that means I'm a little harsh on my heroines! I do like to feel like they fight their way through on their own terms. 

 I loved Uninvited for the questions it made me ponder. I found myself thinking a lot about Nature vs Nurture, and what I would or would not do in Davy's position. I didn't have any similar moments of wonder in Unleashed. I did idly think about how the situation between HTS carriers and the 'normal' folk had deteriorated, and the struggles that would be necessary to make everything right, but that was about it. 

 This brings me to my final comment; I was really surprised that this was the final book about these characters. I felt that the story was setting the scene for the reintegration of the HTS carriers and the normals, and for a Sean vs Caden quandary for Davy... it only became obvious to me in the final few pages that this was all I was getting. It felt to me like the plug had been pulled prematurely on the series. I'm not usually in favour of trilogies for trilogies sakes, but I felt like there was more to say here that has been left unexplored, which is a shame. My recommendation is to read Uninvited and stop there this time - Unleashed isn't a particularly scintillating successor.

Summary:

Unleashed, the romantic, high-stakes sequel to New York Times bestselling author Sophie Jordan's Uninvited, is perfect for fans of James Patterson's Confessions of a Murder Suspect.

Davy has spent the last few months trying to come to terms with the fact that she tested positive for the kill gene HTS (also known as Homicidal Tendency Syndrome). She swore she would not let it change her, and that her DNA did not define her . . . but then she killed a man.

Now on the run, Davy must decide whether she'll be ruled by the kill gene or if she'll follow her heart and fight for her right to live free. But with her own potential for violence lying right beneath the surface, Davy doesn't even know if she can trust herself.