Chosen by PC Cast and Kristin Cast
House of Night book 3
ISBN: 9780312360304
I purchased this book.
Chosen is the Empire Strikes Back of the Casts’ vampire finishing school series. Previously, Zoe Redbird was marked to become a vampyre, a favored person of the night goddess Nyx. Upon entering the House of Night she discovered an imbalance in the workings of the vampires and realized Nyx had charged her with fixing it. In book one Zoey takes on class queen and total meanie, Aphrodite. In book two Zoe learns that Aphrodite was not even close to the big bad of the series and something worse is going on, claiming fledgelings from the House of Night and turning them into something else.
In this third book Zoe now knows that the high priestess of the House of Night, and Zoe’s personal mentor, Neferet, is somehow behind her best friend’s transformation from an ordinary fledgeling into a full realized–something–with a red crescent mark instead of Nyx’s sapphire mark. But no matter how gifted she is, she is still a fledgeling and she’s facing a fully trained, intelligent and malicious adult whose hands are firmly wrapped around other people and other powers.
In addition, Zoey still is finding herself unable to let her human high school boyfriend go, unsure if it’s because she doesn’t want to let go of her human life, or because he’s the only source she has of fresh blood. When vampyre hottie and school poetry teacher Loren Blake starts making some serious moves on her, Zoey finds herself unable to even think or resist against his charms, despite her already complicated love life.
But she has to keep Loren, the red fledgelings and Stevie Rae secret from her best friends, risking their rage, because Neferet’s mind reading powers (which don’t work on Zoey) could put them all in danger. The only person Zoey has to talk to, the only other person immune to Neferet’s mind reading, is Aphrodite, who has been publicly humiliated and abandoned Nyx—according to Neferet. Zoey’s sudden trust of Aphrodite sits just as badly with her friends, prepping the House of Night crew for a show down that’s less magic and fighting and more tempers and ill-will.
Despite the amount of emotional turmoil in this book it manages to avoid being needless high drama. Also missing is the borderline preachiness some readers have found in previous installments of the series. The Casts keep a balance between the elements introduced previously in the series; Zoey’s family troubles, the mystery of the red fledglings, Neferet’s bipolar influences, Zoey’s struggles with her love life, and the battles of high school themselves; and still manage to move the overall plot forward..
If you haven’t read the series before, don’t start here because by this book readers should be well entrenched in the series to understand the importance of the climax and ending. It also helps, since book four is already available if you grab that one as well for a continuous flow of the overall storyline. Again, this is a fabulous dark urban fantasy series for readers who want dangerous and complex, but aren’t ready for the sexual and violent content of more adult series on shelves today.