The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater

Now that the ley lines around Cabeswater have been woken, nothing for Ronan, Gansey, Blue, and Adam will be the same. Ronan, for one, is falling more and more deeply into his dreams, and his dreams are intruding more and more into waking life. Meanwhile, some very sinister people are looking for some of the same pieces of the Cabeswater puzzle that Gansey is after…

The sequel to The Raven Boys, which I read last year so details were fuzzy but luckily, everything came flooding back and the story progressed quite smoothly. However, I don't think I was in the right frame of mind to read this when I did, as I kinda slipped in and out of interest. Nothing to do with the story or the writing, just my lack of brain power.

That being said, I had some major problems with the characters, which is almost certainly my fault, but I just could not connect with them. Maybe it was just the writing style was too much for my poor tired brain but I could only understand the characters in a superficial way. For whatever reason, I didn't get the deep connection  I normally love in my books. I still don't completely understand Gansey, nor Adam, although I do like both of them. I adore Blue but sometimes she reacts in a way I wasn't expecting and it just throws me off. But Ronan was the real focus of this book and I really liked getting the know him in a deeper way. Although I still don't entirely understand why he is irrationally angry all the time, it was interesting and entertaining to read about his family and the dream magic thing.

Anyway, that's enough moaning. Apart from my weird frame of mind, I do love Stiefvater's writing style and while it was a bit complex, The Dream Thieves was just as amazingly detailed and smooth as I have come to expect from her books. As I said, the main focus of this part of the story was Ronan but we also learned more about Gansey's home life, Adam's troubles, both financially and with Cabeswater, and Blue's strange and complicated family. We were also introduced to a new character, My Gray, who has been tasked with finding the Greywarren by a mysterious benefactor. I'm not going to tell you what the Greywarren is but I will tell that My Gray is no stranger to violence. 

So while my tired brain might have ruined some of my enjoyment, I did still really like this, especially to have another chance with these amazing characters and their incredibly crazy journey to find Glendower. Some more clues were revealed and they are one step closer to finding the ancient king. 

Published 5th September 2013 by Scholastic.