Review Xpresso Design Test: The Gathering by Kelley Armstrong

The Gathering
Kelley Armstrong
First published April 12th, 2011
by HarperCollins

Sixteen-year-old Maya is just an ordinary teen in an ordinary town. Sure, she doesn't know much about her background - the only thing she really has to cling to is an odd paw-print birthmark on her hip - but she never really put much thought into who her parents were or how she ended up with her adopted parents in this tiny medical-research community on Vancouver Island.

Until now.

Strange things have been happening in this claustrophobic town - from the mountain lions that have been approaching Maya to her best friend's hidden talent for "feeling" out people and situations, to the sexy new bad boy who makes Maya feel . . . . different. Combine that with a few unexplained deaths and a mystery involving Maya's biological parents and it's easy to suspect that this town might have more than its share of skeletons in its closet.

3 pages! 3 pages is all it took for this book to get thrilling! Armstrong has given us another great novel. Though not as engrossing as The Summoning, it's still a good start.

The Gathering follows Maya, a teenager with a strange connection to animals and an interesting heritage, who is recuperating from her best friend's tragic death. She is one of only 68 kids living in Salmon Creek, a very isolated town created by a research company (ooouuh!) to house their employees' families, where evidently, strange things are starting to occur.

The book starts with a bang, fast paced and gets intriguing quickly. So it really gets you into it. Then about 3/4 through, I realized the pace has slowed down and the anticipation that something exciting was going to happen any minute is just that, anticipation. Unlike The Summoning where we find out about Chloe's necromancy and how the story is going to develop quite early, in The Gathering it's all near the end, and even then we only get a teaser.

I'm still not quite sure the direction the story is going to go. In that way, the book felt more like a build up for the rest of the Trilogy. Regardless, I still quite enjoyed it. Armstrong has never disappointed me so I'm confident that the Trilogy in a whole will be awesome. It sure has great potential. Like usual, we are left with a lot of wonder and mystery, but it's not a jarring cliffhanger.