Review: Sever by Lauren DeStefano
What: Sever (The Chemical Garden #3) by Lauren DeStefano
Who: Harper Collins Publishers
When: 2013
How: Borrowed from library.
With the clock ticking until the virus takes its toll, Rhine is desperate for answers. After enduring Vaughn’s worst, Rhine finds an unlikely ally in his brother, an eccentric inventor named Reed. She takes refuge in his dilapidated house, though the people she left behind refuse to stay in the past. While Gabriel haunts Rhine’s memories, Cecily is determined to be at Rhine’s side, even if Linden’s feelings are still caught between them.
Meanwhile, Rowan’s growing involvement in an underground resistance compels Rhine to reach him before he does something that cannot be undone. But what she discovers along the way has alarming implications for her future—and about the past her parents never had the chance to explain.
In this breathtaking conclusion to Lauren DeStefano’s Chemical Garden trilogy, everything Rhine knows to be true will be irrevocably shattered.
At the end of Fever, Rhine was saved from Vaughn’s clutches by none other than her husband, Linden. Sever begins with Rhine in the hospital, and with Linden watching over her protectively. She tells him everything happened in the basement; the experiments; the children; everything. And Linden is having a hard time believing that the sweet protective father he has known all his life is capable of such atrocities. He’ll soon come to realise exactly what Vaughn’s capable of.
Having found an unexpected new ally in Vaughn’s brother Reed, and with Cecily refusing to leave her side, Rhine finds herself biding her time, when she knows she should be trying to find her brother, or Gabriel, or both. With her feelings caught between Gabriel and Linden, and with her brother, Rowan, starting a revolutionary tirade, Rhine is running out of time to set everything right.
Sever was an amazing conclusion to The Chemical Garden trilogy, even if it nearly made me cry (*shakes fist at author*).
It’s amazing how quickly the storyline progressed. I was halfway throught the book, and I kept thinking: how is she going to tie everything up? How is everything going to be all right? But she did it, and I was mostly pleased.
I was glad to finally meet Rowan, although I had a bit of a hard time conjuring up an image of him in my head, as we hadn’t really received a detailed description of him, except as the child from Rhine’s memories.
There were shocks – too many shocks for my emotional state of well-being to be honest – but I guess they were part of what made this book so good.
The ending is not ‘and they all lived happily ever after’, which is what I was expecting, but it was not ‘the world is a horrible place and everyone is depressed’, either. It was a good ending, and I was pleased with it.
I have loved The Chemical Garden trilogy, and I am so happy that I found these books. I highly recommend them to anyone who is a fan of dystopia/science/love/awesomeness.
© 2013, Chiara @ Books for a Delicate Eternity. All rights reserved.
