Title: The Secret Circle: The Captive Part 2 & The Power
Author: L.J. Smith
Publisher: Harper Teen
Genre: YA Paranormal
Pages: 390
How I Read It: Paperback from the library.
Synopsis: Caught in the struggle between good and evil…
Cassie has joined the most alluring – and deadly – in-crowd imaginable. But power comes with a price, and it’s more dangerous than she knows.
Torn between the dueling desires of the two leaders of the Secret Circle, she must ultimately choose between saving all of New Salem, and her own dangerous love for the bewitching Adam, which threatens to tear the circle apart.
In the ultimate battle between good and evil, will Cassie’s supernatural powers be strong enough to lead the coven out of danger? Or will she fall prey to the dark forces within? Will she sacrifice her love for the circle to survive?
*Synopsis taken from the back of the book
My Review: When we last saw Cassie, she was essentially being blackmailed by Faye, in an attempt to not hurt Diana with the secret of her forbidden relationship with Adam. This one picks up right where the last one left off, since they essentially split the middle book in the trilogy in two for the different omnibus editions.
So, Cassie doesn’t like Faye, but doesn’t want Diana to know all the wretched things she’s been doing for Faye, so she starts stepping away from their friendship. It’s an interesting reminder of what high school used to be like, because I’ve been out of that environment for so long that I forget how little things like this could be a big deal. In my world, I’d just tell Diana what happened, but whatever.
The plot is somewhat predictable in this one – a big bad comes, the kids have to work through their differences to find a way to fight it, confront some others in the community – with a little bit of an old foe thrown in. And because of the TV show, there were some things that would have been surprises had I not seen them on the screen before. That being said, those surprises were a bit more extreme in the book than in the show, making them interesting to read about despite having a general idea about what was going to happen.
I noticed that was the case with nearly everything, it was all more extreme than the same events in the show. I think the most notable being with the characters – Diana was much more forgiving and understanding, Faye was far more manipulative, Cassie was less confident. And one of my favorite things was the explanation for what happened with the parents of the kids of the Circle, it made a lot of sense.
The last book, The Power, was somewhat written to be the end of the series, at the very least it’s the end of the first trilogy. This has been restarted with a new trilogy and a new author, and I have mixed feelings about that. One thing to consider is that these first three books were written in the early 90s, when technology was a lot different than it is now, so I don’t know what to think about a continuation of the series. That being said, I will probably pick the next one up at some point, just to see what I think. If nothing else, it provides an entertaining afternoon!
Read this book if: I would continue this series if you read the first book. If you didn’t, pick that one up first for sure.
My Rating: 3/5 – Two thumbs up, fine holiday fun!
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