Lost Souls by Seth Patrick, Reviver Trilogy #2After the life-altering events of Reviver, Jonah Miller, the world’s most powerful forensic revivalist, is caught between standing up for what he knows is right, and protecting the job he loves.
But the tide is turning. Those who campaign against revival have redoubled their efforts. Better funded, their polemic is working. Public opinion, usually supportive of the revivers, is becoming uneasy.
Then a bizarrely mutilated body is found. The cause of death baffles police, but Jonah suspects that there are other forces at work, forces just as destructive as those he has already faced.
When research efforts begin again to explore the source of revival, old faces reappear and Jonah’s world starts to unravel. As the research closes in on dangerous truths, Jonah and his friends find there’s nowhere left to go; no-one left to trust.
And in the darkness, something is coming.
Has it already been two years since I first read Seth Patrick's debut: Reviver? I still remember that book vividly. With Reviver Seth Patrick, for me, produced a book that showed something new. The whole concept of reviving a person who has been murdered and getting all the details of what exactly happened. This concept was really worked out into the fine details. It takes a lot more to make a book work than just having a cool concept. From start to finish Seth Patrick wrote a very addictive story and went above my expectations. And with Lost Souls, he did so again... If you liked Reviver, you are going to need to read Lost Souls!
Lost Souls picks up how any good horror/thriller story should. A lone girl in an alley way, who goes about her thing but is then confronted by something well supernatural. After this, intense scene the floor is given to Jonah Miller and this first chapter is put somewhat away. Jonah Miller the protagonist of the series went through quite a lot in Reviver even so far as got shot. Lost Souls is the direct sequel and here we see that Jonah is still in the recuperation mode, though he is already back in the field, but with some reluctance though. Even though he has gotten a great gift in being able to revive people who are beyond reviving, where he does get a lot of praise for, you can feel he is tired. The Afterlifers, an organization that is heavily against reviving, is making a lot of fuss around it, going as far as making sure there is a new legislation. One day Jonah is called in for a job, this doesn't go as planned and Jonah sees with all that is happened that it might be best for him to retire from the FRS and to take up private revivals... This brings Jonah into a new field and he is immidiately called upon by an friend. Which brings me back to the first chapter of the book. Jonah is asked to revive that person and find out what exactly happended. Because she wasn't the first, there murders with similar sign before and if they are dealing with a serial killer, she won't be the last. Reviving a person is the only way possible of catching this person... Everything has to be rushed though as the Afterlifers are also getting their hands in this case. The only lead that Jonah gets shadows. After the revival of this young girl Jonah's life is suddenly put up side down again. Because Michael Andreas. He is back. With only one goal in mind. I think you can guess what that might be.
Above I only laid down the path that Jonah follows, but there are other perspetive offered like that of Annabel the young girl that Jonah befriended in the first book and who became more than friends. In Lost Souls there relation is in the balance as Annabel only wants to find out the truth about Andreas and what caused the big fire in the first book. She is so determined that she doesn't give Jonah and their relationship the time it needs. Jonah being the love fool he is knows that it is going down the drain but the moments they still share make up for it. Annabel actually gives a very nice perspective as through here you slowely get the truth of what Andreas' company was up to, and why it was investing again in a cryogenic facility.
Just a brief thing about the story in Lost Souls, I can safely say that the story for me was quite something different compared to the first book. Of course it has the same addictive writing style of the first book, nice pacing and a lot of twists and turns, but what is different is the much darker sense of the story with the shadows and what Jonah uncovers as the story progresses with readily transform the last book in the series. I must say that I wasn't expecting the turn around of events to give the sort of ending that Seth Patrick gave, but when you look at the whole promise of it all it will give a grande finale. Overall taken book one and two together it becomes readily noticeable that Seth Patrick cleverly used the foundation that he laid in Reviver to build an even spectacular and much more scarier story. The focus shift more towards a horror/thriller story that used the reviving ability as a guideline instead of keeping to drone on just reviving subjects and creating a bore. For me this is the best possible utilization of the feat to be honest. Nice stuff!
Once again in Lost Souls, Jonah Miller and his friend Never Geary make up for a great interactive duo and do so liven up the storyline. Not fully by making a lot of jokes, but the level that they have in their friendship is perhaps the only positive point in the dark and grim setting of the story. Jonah for me seemed very much more mature in Lost Souls than in the first book. Some of this transformation was done of screen but as the story is developing he grows and grows much more and really gets to know what he himself is capable of. If you ever think that Jonah is just a geeky guy, you are wrong. The same counts for Never, who was Jonah's technician in the FRS, though yes, he is still and will always be a bit of a technology nerd. He is the friend you want to have when everything goes to hell in a handbasket.
If you liked Reviver you sure don't want to miss Lost Souls. I was already very impressed with the story that Seth Patrick showed in his debut, but in Lost Souls, he really goes beyond his expectations again. As I said the story doesn't solely focus on only reviving subjects, it shifts gradually towards a more dark horror/trhiller thinged story that utilizes the reviving ability. By this Seth Patrick creates a nail-biting action packed book. And again that ending. Some people are meant to be a pawn, but what if the king is released? It is promising to be quite the finale in the third book!
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