Hollow City: The Second Novel of Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children, #2)

This second novel begins in 1940, immediately after the first book ended. Having escaped Miss Peregrine's island by the skin of their teeth, Jacob and his new friends must journey to London, the peculiar capital of the world. Along the way, they encounter new allies, a menagerie of peculiar animals, and other unexpected surprises. Complete with dozens of newly discovered (and thoroughly mesmerizing) vintage photographs, this new adventure will delight readers of all ages.

• ISBN10: 1594746125
• ISBN13: 9781594746123
• Publish Date: 14 January 2014
• Publish Status: Active
• Out of Print: 4 April 2022
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Quirk Books
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 400
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9781594746123

Reviews

[MurderByDeath]

More often than not, I struggle to like the second book of a trilogy and Hollow City is no exception.  To me, the second book feels like all the boring bits between the excitement of discovery and the thrill of the finale stretched out to 'make do' as a book.  In other words, book two is all existential navel gazing and I get bored.   Hollow City was not without excitement though; there were plenty of battles between the peculiar children and the hollows, and Jacob gets to use and stretch and refine his power, but mostly it's children bonding (go team!), true love (*eye roll*), evil plot to end the world revealed in all its evil glory (*gasp*) and existential navel gazing.   I'm being a bit cheeky; I did enjoy, it just wasn't great.  There are a couple of twists at the end; one I really didn't see coming and the other was, I suppose, inevitable, and it ends in something of a cliffhanger with the tried and true 'friends in peril' plot device fully engaged.  I already have the third book so it's definitely going to get read, but I'm not in a rush.   I read this for the Chilling Children square and it was more apt than I could have dreamed, as the power of one of the peculiar children is, in fact, freezing whatever she touches.  Chilling children indeed.

Ontzettend goed boek, maar toch miste ik iets.
http://www.threecupsoffantasy.com/recensie-omhulde-stad-miss-peregrines-peculiar-children-2/

[Terri M. LeBlanc]

The Miss Peregrine series by Ransom Riggs is one of my favorite series. It combines several things that I am dearly fond of.

• A compelling historical fiction plot with endearing protagonists and creepy antagonists.


• The physical book is a beauty to behold and is a good weight (not too heavy and not too light). It's well constructed with amazingly odd photographs, detailed end papers with a design that repeats itself at chapter and part breaks.


• Without the dustcover, the book appears to be an old classic with its silver inlaid title and decorations. And when placed side by side with book one is the series, it creates a lovely symmetrical tableau on my bookshelf.

The second book in the Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children series, Hollow City isn't nearly as creepy as book one and it has a faster pace. Hollow City picks up right where book one left off and doesn't let up till the end. Which for some empathetic readers, like myself, can be a tad overwhelming.

There is great character development for Emma and Jacob as they grow to know themselves and each other through the perils they face with the other Peculiars. Young love is always so heartwarming and Riggs approaches their relationship with care. Their love for each other is real, hard to deny and surprising in all the gloom.

"I felt it too: the dread, the weight of the horrors we'd seen, which replayed themeselves in an endless, lurid loop in my mind. But you can't feel bad every second, I wanted to tell her. Laughing doesn't make the bad things worse any more than crying makes them better. It doesn't mean you don't care, or that you've forgotten. It just means you're human."

The only downside was the pacing. I love fast-paced action and adventure, but you can go too fast. So many horrible things continue to happen to the Peculiars one right after the other that I was as emotionally drained as the they were by the end of the book. There is no winning. Even the one bright moment early in the book is marred by the constant fear of being discovered and not really knowing who to trust. I wished there was more down time (not necessarily happy times) to give me and the characters a bit more time to rest and recover. I could not put this book down, but it was more of the lack of a clean break in the plot than it was a "OMG! What's going to happen next?!".

I can't wait to see where Riggs takes the Peculiars next. The end reveal and Jacob's final decision came as a surprise and was deftly handled. Book three, according to GoodReads, is expect to release yet in 2015. So perhaps I won't have to wait long to find out how this strange story with its odd photographs will conclude.

This review was originally posted on Second Run Reviews.

[Sam@WLABB]

Oh, RR, how could you leave me with that ending?!!!

In "Hollow City", we catch up with Miss P's peculiar kids. The story begins right where the last installment ended. In this book, we see the kids growing, their desire for self preservation expanding to saving the peculiar race and even the normals.

Some of the great stuff?
The time jumping. It is really interesting to read about the differences as they enter different temporal loops.
The love story grows. I am a sucker for a romance and we get to see the love between Jacob and Emma blossom.
Jacob comes into his power. Jacob is learning more and more about his peculiar powers and is proving to be quite the bad-ass.
More peculiar history. We learn a lot more about the world of peculiars, wights and hollows. It is quite a well crafted and interesting world too.
Action, action, action. There is a lot going on here as the kids constantly battle for survival in their attempts to save themselves and their race.

Uggghhhhhhh, book 3!!!! I need to know what happens to Miss P, Jacob, Emma and all my other friends.

[thepunktheory]

Finally I got around reading this book. I was very fond of the first one and "Hollow City" didn't disappoint me. The story is thrilling and you get sucked in from the very first page. Many interesting and fascinating and of course peculiar things await in this novel. I never gets boring and just when you think you know what's gonna happen next, everything changes.
Another point I really appreciate about this book are the very thoughtfully chosen photos that are included. Some of them can be a bit creepy but they help to create the perfect atmosphere for reading. I wonder how Ransom Riggs does it: Is he running around collecting vintage photos and then creates a story around them? It's amazing how much time and effort he must have put in gathering all these images.
All I can say is I love the book and whoever liked part one shouldn't miss "Hollow City". Can't wait for part 3!

[stressedrach]

Ever since reading book one of the Peculiar Children series I have been thinking back to it, awaiting the time when book two was released and hoping that I would enjoy it as much as I did the first and that it would have as much impact on me.

I was really excited when the book dropped through my letterbox and I was eager to start reading it.

The book starts off from the exact point that the first book ends which I liked as nothing was missing and I was lost in the world of peculiar children who I adore.

Jacob and the children endure a journey to London to find help for Miss Peregrine who is stuck in bird form and cannot change back to human form. Along the way they are dodging wights and hollows who are tracking them .Jacob and the peculiar children also meet new peculiar people and animals too.

This was a fantastic sequel with just as much adventure and fantasy as the first I was completely hooked.

The vintage photographs are brilliant and adds to the imagination while reading the book.

It was very well written and flowed very smoothly. Ending on another cliffhanger I cannot wait until book 3 is released.

[Chelsea]

Initial Thoughts
I really enjoyed the first book in this series and I was really excited for this one. It took me much too long to start it but when I did I couldn’t stop. I love the idea of using the vintage photography but I was nervous that it wouldn’t be as good in this second book since we’d already met all the characters. I loved how the book just continued directly where the last one left off. There was no in between where you don’t know what happened.

My New Best Friend
I really like Emma. She’s brave and admirable. She’s the kind of female character that I enjoy reading about. I love how she kind of took the position of leader in this book, it made her stand out more to me. I have a hard time not picturing all the kids as 12 year olds though. For some reason that’s how they appear to me even though they’re at least 16. Maybe it’s the pictures of the younger kids that were in the book. I don’t know.

My Crush
I’m not sure if I had a crush in this book. As I said before, the characters felt young to me. I really like Millard though because he always just pops up when they need him. I love that he was always figuring out where they should go next. Who doesn’t like a smart guy?

Writing Style
The writing sometimes seems a little formal to me but that’s the only flaw. I don’t usually like books that take place in the past but this one was different for me. The author only writes what needs to be written. There aren’t any parts where you’re wondering why is that there. Everything is important and makes sense.

Closing Thoughts
I loved this book as much as the first. The bar was set really high and I think he met my expectations. I love how he mixes fantasy with history. It’s a fun twist. It’s nice when an author tries hard to be different and succeeds. It’s not quite up to 5 stars since I found it a little bit slow at the start. It was also a little weird that they met peculiars everywhere when they’re supposed to be rare. I know it was part of the story but it could have been a little better. I was a little disappointed that all they really did in this book was run around looking for someone. I’m hoping it will be the next book is full of action. It just felt like the author kind of stretched the story based on the photos when he should have stretched the photos to be part of the story. Either way it was still a great book.

Bonus
The author adds pictures to his story which makes it really unique. They’re real pictures that haven’t been altered which makes it kind of cool.