The Curse of Tenth Grave

Jones's writing is so freaking brilliant. I cannot believe that an author can whittle me down so hard then build me back up so fantastically. It's amazing!

Okay so halfway through this book I was ready to take a break from it because it reintroduced a motif that ran through the entire series that I didn't particularly care for. Basically, the fact that in every single book there's always a lack of communication between Reyes and Charley. There's always too many secrets and it was really starting to tear me down in the sense that I wanted a break if the book series was going to continue on this way. But oh, what a surprise I was in for! Once I decided to stop being a coward and keep reading the second half of the book, I was able to see the deviousness behind Darynda Jones and her amazing writing skills.

There was a second thing that really fascinated me about this book and that was the character development. No doubt it goes hand-in-hand with what I mentioned before but Charley was almost like a–should I dare say it?–an adult in this book. She didn't lose any of her quirks–thank god–but even Reyes was proud of her. She was able to be objective about certain things that involved the people closest to her while not losing any of her fiery passion. She's able to see the consequences of her actions and either face them and apologize when she's in the wrong or fight for what she believes in and confront the risks.

Reyes grew a lot as well because he's able to open himself up and express his insecurities. For lack of a better word, it shows the humanity in him and the utter depths of his soul that have nothing to do with his hellish background but how he was able to rise up from the ashes, so to speak.

Overall, another awesome installment in a wonderful series.

(Can someone tell me if there's a blog out there that's collected all the little quotes that are posted at the beginning of every chapter? I'd love to revisit the ones from past books because they just keep getting better and better.)