Book Review :: Reckless by Lauren Roberts

Reckless by Lauren Roberts
ISBN: 1398530123
Series: The Powerless Trilogy #2
Also in this series: Powerless, Powerful, Fearless
Published by Simon & Schuster Children's UK
on 2 July 2024
Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult
Pages: 400
Goodreads

The kingdom of Ilya is in turmoil…

After surviving the Purging Trials, Ordinary-born Paedyn Gray has killed the King, and kickstarted a Resistance throughout the land. Now she’s running from the one person she had wanted to run to.

Kai Azer is now Ilya’s Enforcer, loyal to his brother Kitt, the new King. He has vowed to find Paedyn and bring her to justice.

Across the deadly Scorches, and deep into the hostile city of Dor, Kai pursues the one person he wishes he didn’t have to. But in a city without Elites, the balance between the hunter and hunted shifts – and the battle between duty and desire is deadly.

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What is Reckless by Lauren Roberts about?

Reckless by Lauren Roberts is the second book in the Powerless trilogy, and needless to say, everything in Ilya is falling apart. And Paeydn is right at the heart of it.

After surviving the Purging Trials in Powerless, Paedyn has sparked a rebellion that’s spreading fast. But instead of finding freedom, she’s now being hunted by the one person she never wanted to lose: Kai.

Kai Azer has become Ilya’s Enforcer, and he is loyal to his brother Kitt, the new king. As the kingdom’s enforcer, his job is to find Paedyn and bring her in to stand trial and be made accountable for all she did in the previous book. He’s made a promise to bring the woman he was falling in love with back to his brother for her potential execution.

As he follows her across the scorched lands and into the dangerous city of Dor, everything begins to shift. In a place where the Elites have no power, the roles of pursuer and prey are not so clear. And with every step, the fight between loyalty and love grows harder to ignore.

My thoughts on Reckless

Another excellent addition to this series, which I’m mad I waited so long to start. The first in this series, Powerless, was so good that I just sort of kept reading. The novella or 1.5 book, Powerful, was just as good, so by the time I got to Reckless was expecting superb things.

And Roberts delivered.

While there was a lot of time just wandering around the desert in this one (one of the reasons I dropped it a star), the storyline really showcased the internal tortures of the characters and their fates and duties. Paedyn and Kai are feisty with each other. Their hate towards each other after the information they find out at the end of the first book is fuelled by the love they were growing and, as you can imagine, things get a bit intense.

As they battle each other and their duties and their feelings, the two slowly make their way back to Ilya, back to Kitt (Kai’s brother who is now king), and back to an impending death for Paedyn.

We have a mixed POV in this book – Paedyn and Kai, but also a few chapters here and there from Kitt. And the ending … my actual goodness. If you’ve read it, you’ll know. I did call it not that far into Reckless, but it was still a brilliant way to end the second book.

The third in the series, Fearless, was ready for me to just dive in, which I did. Rapidly. I so enjoyed this series.

Have you read this series? Are you up to Reckless? Let me know what you thought!