*** This review is for the third book in a series. There will be spoilers for the previous two books.***How 'bout that cliffhanger ending in Onyx, huh? Dawson coming back and so very changed from his time with Daedalus. Daemon's completely heart-wrenching reaction. Katy's being captured and tortured by evil Will. Will forcing Daemon's hand. Adam dying...Yeah. Things gotta whole lotta messed up last book and loads more serious, leaving me to agonize for months on end as to what the fallout of everything would be in Opal.So was I excited about this book?Uh, that would be a ginormous understatement.If you read my Onyx review, you may remember that I loved that book. Like loved it, loved it. (My exclamation point key still bears some emotional trauma from that particular review.) And so I was expecting nothing short of absolute amazingness from Opal. I may have set my standards a bit too high in this case, though. So please take my following comments with a grain of salt. While I really did enjoy Opal, it didn't quite leave the impression that Obsidian & Onyx did. It definitely has the feel of a transition book - a middle book. While Jennifer definitely maintains that "when is the other shoe going to drop?!" desperate vibe throughout the book, it just lacks... "oomph?" There is just something missing, and I still can't quite put my finger on what that is exactly.Maybe the plot and the pacing just fell a little flat overall? While I love Daemon & Katy as much (or possibly more) than the next person and while the strength of these books really lies in Jennifer's excellent ability to create characters and connections, in Opal it felt as though the plot suffered for this. The story serves more the purpose of increasing the romantic tension between Daemon & Katy rather than both the plot and romance building simultaneously alongside one another. Which, seriously, I love the romance in these books, BUT in seeing how Jennifer stepped it up in the Covenant series with a largely more sophisticated plot while also ramping up the romance, I was hoping for much of the same in Opal. However, it just didn't reach that level for me.Things I love...Daemon & Katy. Their chemistry is always fantastic, and they remain one of my favorite on-page couples. They are both changing and growing and learning how to navigate the uncharted waters of their new relationship and it's sweet, it's butterfly-inducing, it's painful, and it's passionate.Katy. I've really enjoyed her growth to this point in the series. No longer is she the quiet bookworm, but rather a strong, confident young woman who fights for those she loves and for what she believes in. I particularly love her internal struggles throughout Opal as she wrestles with difficult moral questions and the ongoing physical changes that are inherent with being a hybrid.Daemon. Still Daemon, but not quite as rough-edged. He's sweet. He's really what he's always been - a guy who loves his family and will do anything to protect them. We get to see more of Daemon's vulnerable side with Dawson coming home and the circumstances that they all are thrown into as a consequence of how things played out in Onyx.In the previous books, I kind of had the sense that nothing could get the best of Daemon. That's totally silly, I know, and a complete illusion, but he's just so confident that I just kind of expected him to always get the best of any problem. But he is only... er... Luxen, after all. And though that's always been the case, that fact didn't really stand out to me until the end of last book and throughout this one. Oh he's still extremely confident and totally capable and downright scary sometimes, but what they're up against... well, it's pretty formidable.Dawson. I heart him, and his character development is so wonderfully done. Side note, if you have somehow have missed reading Shadows, the prequel novella, you should definitely read it before reading Opal. It's rather necessary to understanding Dawson's character.The ending. YES. PERFECT. This is what I was hoping for more of throughout the book in general... and I did eventually get it in the end. Overall. Though it didn't quite live up to my, perhaps, impossibly high hopes, ultimately, Opal is an enjoyable read... and provided me with a much needed Daemon & Katy fix. I'm totally jonesin' for Origin... it's about to get super real up in here, y'all.
