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"Max?"
"Yes?"
"Will you remember me?"
His heart broke into a thousand pieces. "Always.”



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2nd read - 11 March to 13 March 2013
3rd read - 3 May to 5 May 2014
4th read - 15 to 21 April 2015
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I'm going to start this review by saying that I absolutely adore Sophia and as a result there may be some gushing about her in this review.


As with 'Blaze of Memory' this book has a different feel to it compared to the rest in the series. Here we get to see the development of a relationship between a Human and a Psy who is all but broken. We first met Enforcement officer Max Shannon in 'Mine to Possess' after he'd traveled to San Francisco in order to help Tally with the disappearance of children linked to The Shine Foundation. We learned then that Max had incredibly strong natural mental shields that prevented Psy from messing with his mind (Human's lack of natural shields being something that the Psy have taken advantage of regularly). On account of these shields and his moral code Max is a rarity in Enforcement, he is incorruptible.

Sophia, a J-Psy, a Psy designation that allows her to enter someones mind and take their memories, then share it with others, is introduced to us as she sits across from a human serial killer, she is about to attempt to enter his mind in order to find the burial sites of his victims. Max has dedicated himself to capturing the truly evil Gerard Bonner and bringing his victims home. Bonner is a twisted individual and the insight we get into his mind is really very unpleasant.


Sophia is incredible, she faces down an absolute loop the loop, enters his mind and sees the nightmares that he has gotten off on. But this is her job, she has done it countless times, she has done it so often that her telepathic shields are all but worn away and she knows that soon the world will bombard her and drive her to insanity. Sophia's gift is such that it is unlikely that she was ever really Silent which makes the fact that she is still sane even more incredible. Her life is quite simply a living nightmare.


Add to that a heart breaking past and a crushing sense of loneliness and it becomes almost too much to bare.


Sophia knows her time is almost up, and when she gets recruited by Councillor Nikita Duncan to pursue a traitor within Nikita's ranks she realizes that her time is hurtling ever faster to an end, when she discovers that Max has also been brought into work with Nikita she decides to try and live before it all ends, by doing so she allows Max to give her something beyond compare.


Max and Sophia are both broken in some way but as Max points out together they make a whole. They both fit together and Max accepts everything that is Sophia and he does not see her as flawed and scarred, what he sees when he looks at her is everything he wants. I liked Max before, but the way he treats Sophia is so sweet and tender that it's hard to do anything but love him in the end.



WARNING, PRETENTIOUS WAFFLE TO FOLLOW AND MAY CAUSE FLASHBACKS TO LITERARY THEME EXAM QUESTIONS

Now I'm not one for pulling different themes out of books (there is always a but!!) BUT this story seemed somehow darker than any of the others to me, I think maybe it was the human element involved here. This series is fantasy but with the addition of a human serial killer a certain amount of reality manages to make its way on to the page. Gerard Bonner is not a fictional character in a fictional world he is very real but he has many different faces and many different names, humans are capable of great cruelty and evil. But, on the other hand as humans we are also capable of great kindness, dignity and compassion, the ability to stand up for what is right and fight for what we believe in such as the way Max does. Bonner definitely stayed with me a lot longer than the other villains in this series and I think that the reason for that was his humanity or lack of.
PRETENTIOUS WAFFLE ENDS

Anyhoots, I really liked this, Max and Sophia are great together and I loved their story, again there is not much of the Changeling's in this but we see snippets. We get to see how amazingly, totally, fabulously, incredibly in love the oh so perfect Sascha and Lucas are. This is not getting old at all.

Seriously though, they are becoming nauseating!!!



Also from what we learn in this book, Nakita and Kaleb don't appear to be what they seem. Most intriguing!!