Book 21 of 2024: Like a River Glorious

[thistlechaser]

Like a River Glorious (Gold Seer Trilogy, 2) by Rae Carson.

Quick synopsis: In book 1, Lee and her found family made the cross-country wagon train trip to not-yet-a-state California. In this book, Lee and her friends are captured by her evil uncle and have to escape. (Book 1 reviewed by me here.)

Plot: With Lee, her best friend/love interest Jefferson, and the gaggle of other people who traveled with her on the wagon train now settled down, they start their new life of building up a place to live while panning for gold... with some help of her minor magical powers of sensing gold.

All too soon, her evil uncle (Hiram) finds her, captures her, Jefferson, and one of the "college men" (a trio of gay men who dropped out of university to all travel West together).

Uncle Hiram is not just evil, he's obsessed with Lee... or rather Lee's mother, and he tries to turn Lee into her. It was a really weird, uncomfortable "I want to make Lee both my daughter and my wife" kind of thing. Icky to read about (so good work author, I guess?).

The entire plot was just how evil the uncle was, how badly he treated everyone (the native population, the Chinese, women, everyone). Eventually Lee and company escape and make it back to their newly formed town.

Writing/editing: Nearly repeating what I said about book 1: Both were good. I spotted only one editing error, and Carson knows how to write a fast-paced story.

What I Liked/What I Didn’t Like: While I LOVED book 1, the plot of this one was radically different. I didn't like it nearly as much, but I liked it enough to finish reading this book in one day.

The bad guy of the book, uncle Hiram, was Bad Bad McBad, but he was believable. But still, I just wasn't all that interested in him as a character, and this whole book was about him.

I know books need plots and tension, but I wish the story had stayed within the newly founded town; I would rather have seen how it grew than all the stuff with the evil uncle.

Rating: 1-Hated / 2-Disliked / 3-Okay / 4-Liked / 5-Loved: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ½. 4.5 stars, down a half-star from the first book. You'd think not liking the whole plot would reduce the rating by more than that, but I read book 2 even faster than book 1...