Angelopolis

I am maybe going to over load you with book reviews this weekend because I have finished quite a few and I am in need of getting things off my desk. Including the stack of books in the "type reviews" pile.

Angelopolis - Danielle Trussoni

Hailed by USA Today as “a thrill ride best described as The Da Vinci Code meets Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Danielle Trussoni’s bestselling first novel, Angelology, wove biblical lore, the Orpheus myth, and Milton’s Rebel Angels into a present-day world tinged with the divine supernatural. The novel plunged two endearing loners—art historian V. A. Verlaine and Evangeline, a beautiful young nun—into an ancient battle between a secret society and mankind’s most insidious enemies: angel-human hybrids known as the Nephilim.

Now a decade has passed since Verlaine saw Evangeline alight from the Brooklyn Bridge, the sight of her wings a betrayal that haunts him still. The Nephilim are again on the rise, scheming to construct their own paradise—the Angelopolis—and ruthlessly pursued by Verlaine in his new calling as an angel hunter. But when Evangeline materializes, Verlaine is besieged by doubts that will only grow as forces more powerful than even the Nephilim draw them from Paris to Saint Petersburg and deep into the provinces of Siberia and the Black Sea coast. A high-octane tale of abduction and liberation, treasure seeking and divine warfare,Angelopolis plumbs Russia’s imperial past, modern genetics, and the archangel Gabriel’s famous visitations to conceive a fresh tableau of history and myth that will, once again, enthrall readers the world over.

Before I start this review, I want you to read my review of the first book Angelology, because I absolutely loved that book. Several people got it for their birthday in 2011 because it was that good. If I give you a book, it's because I've read it and it was good. I'm not even one to like books with a religious theme to it but that book sucked me in and I couldn't stop. I was so excited for this one to come out and then I was greatly disappointed in how much I hated it. 

Because it's basically nothing like the first book at all. Maybe because it's ten years later, or maybe because Evangeline made her choice to become what she does. Maybe because I held out romantic hope between Evangeline and Verlaine and I don't even know why. When I started this book I was so hopeful. By the time I finished it, which was so difficult to do because it was just so boring, I really hated Evangeline. And Verlaine because he turns out to be a bit of an ass. 

I thought if I had to read any more about a seed catalog, I was going to lose it. I was equally lost when the author is tirelessly describing various angels, what they look like and their capabilities, because I was left wondering if I'm going to need this information to make the book seem clear, and then as it turns out- I don't. It was useless and confusing and sucked the life right out of me. 

Honestly, for as long as we waited for this follow up book, it's incomplete and kind of half assed. At this point I really wish the author hadn't even bothered because it could have been so much more and instead it's such a let down. Maybe this is a case of "just put it out, they'll eat it up" and that makes them rush through refining key parts of the story. I really can't tell you what a let down this one was. *sigh* And can I say the first book had so many quotes in it that were so thought provoking and I had really hoped to get at least one in this one? My favorite line from the first book was, "Angel and devil, he said. One is but a shade of the other." And MAN. How awesome is that? As awesome as it is, I got nothing from this book. It's actually taken me months to read because I would read a chapter and get so damn irritated and put it down until I finished another book. 

So the moral here is read the first book, it was amazing, and skip this. Pretend it never happened and it's just a dirty rumor.