Review: Calculated Risks

Calculated Risks by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thanks to Netgalley and Berkley for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I love pretty much everything Seanan McGuire writes. Seriously, she's one of my favorite authors and she's highly prolific at releasing content. She writes at least one installment in each of her three main series (Incryptid, October Date, Wayward Children) every year, along with short stories and novellas every month, comic books, and usually at least one other novel a year. So there's the caveat - I'm a fanboy, so you'll probably see me raving over the books even when they have flaws. :)

This one picks up like half an hour after the last one ended, give or take. And boy is this one a doozy - they've ended up in an unexpected place and in a very unexpected situation. Yikes, the situation is bad. Annie, Artie, James, Sarah, and Mark have to navigate the new territory while also navigating each other, which adds some fun to the mix. But as someone who has high levels of empathy, it was also hard to read because I kept feeling so bad for Sarah! Trying not to spoil anything here.

So basically, this book involves all the usual fun of Incryptid - witty banter, great characters, weird situations... but for the first time we've got zombies (okay, sorry Annie, "husks"), giant bugs (sorry if you're afraid of spiders... Calculated Risks might exacerbate that greatly), and multiple-mooned-orange-colored skies.

Basically, it was a lot of fun, with a minor annoyance of the repetitive discussions on good and bad cuckoos.

This series is HIGHLY recommended - but please start at the beginning.

View all my reviews