Cauldron of Hope and Sorrows (The Four Keys Book 2) – J.C. Lucas
Synopsis
Freya and her army are rising up… They have no shame, and they will kill whoever gets in their way.
With an evil army wreaking havoc on her town, Andie needs to find the second Key, and quick. To do so, she must harness her powers and make the treacherous journey to Murias. Navigating the enchanted but perilous place becomes quite the challenge for her and her friends, with new adversaries and allies around every corner.
Confusion wars within Andie as she finds herself torn between feelings for the arrogant shifter, or the sweet and kind warlock who seems to always be there when she needs him.
Soon it becomes all too clear that she will have to make the hardest decision of her life and acquire the second Key at the same time.
Continue the journey.
Review
“Just remember, no matter what you might go through, shine bright for all to see. You are our light. You will guide us home.”
Hunter is alive, but he’s changed. Freya did something to him and now he is on her side. This means that his mission is to kill Andie.
Celeste, Aine and Coeus are trying to find a cure but without success. Andie is desperate for helping Hunter. But after seeing him, she understands that she can’t do anything immediately, and needs to focus on finding the second Key.
Trying to take Hunter off her mind, she asks for permission to snoop on the Oak. She is allowed with the warning that some objects may be dangerous. The tree has 20 floors inside. I bet you know what happened. She activated one object by accident.
She got lucky and the object not only didn’t kill her, but it ended up giving her a clue of where to find the second Key, Dagda’s Cauldron.
Once I was done and as I pulled my jeans back up, a protrusion in my pocket brushed against my hand, and I reached in to pull it out. I was developing a bad habit of putting stuff in pockets and forgetting about them.
Shaking my head at myself, I glanced down to see what treasure I had this time.
After Freya starts appearing more in the city, and she with the Fomori even start scaring the humans. Andie must hurry to her mission.
This time without Hunter. But Teagan, Killian, Charlie and Emric join her again. Presley too, her friend who turned out to be a White Tiger Shifter. Yep, everyone around her had secrets.
Here we are back to no one listening to me. Fine. I’d just wait and see how far their stupid plan got them. Personally, I thought my idea was better.
And talking about secrets. Teagan may have made a big mistake.
As the mission wasn’t hard enough, Andie finds out that Teagan had feelings for her. But she has a crush on Hunter (I told you I smelled a love triangle and Teagan was doomed ?).
He was right, but this conversation and my exhaustion were starting to wear on me. Tired Andie is not always nice Andie, and the moment the words left my mouth. I instantly regretted it. “Teagan, I’m sorry. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. We’ve got more important things to worry about right now”.
This second book caught me way more than the first one. I still think that Andie is a little… Not so smart sometimes, but the place of the annoying damsel in distress was taken by Pres. No offense intended, I loved her. She’s too funny.
“Why do all the really deadly creatures look so cute?” Presley questioned behind me.
“For that reason. Had you not been told of the danger; you may very well have gone right up to one and given it a smooch,” Emric replied dryly.
“Sometimes the deadliest things come in familiar packages.”
Andie still complains all the time though. But I understand it. It seems to be her way to release stress. I spent half of the book laughing at the things that she knew she shouldn’t do but didn’t care and did it anyway.
I’d been in this same situation one too many times. This almost dying stuff had to stop!
Andie’s premonitions get more constants and terrible. I felt I knew all along everything that would happen. But not the outcome and that was what forced me to read even faster. Until I got to the cliffhanger at the end.
So far this story seems to me like an incredible mix of a lot of books that I’ve read. The Hunger Games, for example. I couldn’t avoid feeling the similarities between what happened to Hunter and what happened to Peeta. It also gives me the same feeling that Unwritten by Tara Gilboy.
I truly enjoyed this book and recommend it as a fast and fun read. But with a nice and interesting background story. Everytime I’m more and more sure that J.C. put everything that came to her mind into the book and honestly, I love it.
I even turned Emric into a peanut butter sandwich when I intended to turn him into a zebra. Yeah, I know, poor Emric, but really, he was fine and actually got a kick out of it until I finally turned him back, and he had peanut butter all in his fur.
PS: Freya is too sadistic. She really is sick.
Bye bye ?