From the Earth to the Shadows (Valkyrie, #2)

by Amanda Hocking

[readingwithwrin]

"Life very rarely comes down to heroes and villains. It's usually just everyone doing what they can to survive, and the best of us will help more than we hurt."

Thank you to St.Martin's Press, Netgalley and Wednesday Books for an e-arc in exchange for my honest review!

May Contain Spoilers if you haven't read the first book.

From the Earth to the Shadows starts a few days after the first book ended and we jump right back into having to save the world.

This one has all the same characters as the first one with a few new characters add in. With Valeska being one of the most important new characters, as well as being one of my favorites. She's someone that is so valuable in this book, and I loved how skeptical she was about certain things.

Malin and her friends are still jumping into things head first, and not asking questions about things and just doing what they are told. Which leads to a few scuffles at times, and some near deaths happening because we're dealing with the underworld!

From the Earth to the Shadows was also full of so many surprises. Not only did we get to see a whole new world, and WOW it was terrifying! We also get to see characters back stories and really learn why certain things have happened. (I'm not going to say more, because I don't want to give anything away.)

"Everything can be stopped. Even death. That's the problem, isn't it?"

Overall I loved this duology! I'm someone who struggles with fantasy at times, for different reasons. Hocking does such a good job of giving just the right amount of description and letting the characters really help you see the world through their eyes.

Malin and the other characters grew so much from the first book and I loved them all by the end. I also really liked how Hocking still made this feel like a Young Adult to New Adult age range book. She never made it so the core group of characters were suddenly all-knowing about what was happening. Older characters were brought in and it was explained how the main characters knew the older characters and why they were asking them for help. It made to feel very natural and I really appreciated that. I also really liked how definitions of things were included in the back of the book. This really helped me remember certain things from the first book, and was just really nice in general in case I found something confusing.
This duology kept me hooked that I had to know what was going to happen next. By the end of this book, I was so invested in all the characters and this world that I was sad to see it end. I cannot wait to read more of Hocking's books in the future!

"Now do I see heroes anew. The motherless children rise together."

*All quotes are from an unfinished arc and are subject to change.


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