And so we continue with the adventures of Helios né Frankenstein and all the troubles he’s causing for modern day New Orleans.

Of the main plotlines, we get a lot more of Randall Six and Arnie. I like the story in general, but the pacing is strange, stretching across two books and then sort of ending.

We get Helios and yet another Erika, along with all sorts of things starting to go wrong with the New Race. It’s pushing increasingly into Horror, especially Body Horror, and I like it. The only gotcha is that it feels rather weird for it all to be going wrong now. I do like seeing more variations and points of view among the New Race. They’re not all the same, no matter how much Helios wants them to be and that is fascinating. Especially when you bring Deucalion into the mix.

We get more of Carson and Michael, now off the rails and going straight cop turned vigilante. It makes sense, given the complete inability to know who’s Old and who’s New, but it still is a bit jarring. I do love their banter. At this point, I wholly expect one or both not to survive the series, which is a bummer, but expected in this sort of thing.

I think the weirdest thing about this book (and the series thus far) is that it really all feels like one very very long single novel. The ’endings’ do tend to end at least one plot thread, but there are always new things being brought up and random threads ending well before the end of a book. I’m not sure I care for the style. But I’m too into the series now to stop!

All that being said, it’s a good book and I’m looking forward to where we go next!

One bad day, when Vicky had been missing Arthur, her dead husband, almost more than she could bear, though she had not openly expressed her misery, Arnie had reacted to her state of mind and had spoken without glancing at her. “You’re only as lonely as you want to be,” he’d said, “and he would never want you to be.” Although she tried to engage the boy in conversation, he said no more. That day, she had perceived a more mysterious aspect to autism in general and to Arnie’s case in particular than she’d previously recognized. His isolation was beyond Vicky’s power to heal, yet he had reached out to counsel her in her loneliness.

Honesty and empathy.

To the Old Race, home is the center of existence. Home is the first refuge from—and last defense against—the disappointments and the terrors of life. The heart of the home is the kitchen. He knows this to be true because he has read it in a magazine about home decor and in another magazine about cooking light. In addition, Martha Stewart has said this is true, and Martha Stewart is, by acclamation of the Old Race, the ultimate authority on such matters.

Home is where the … hearts are?

When other people are angry with you—as Victor often is—you can turn further inward and escape from them. When it is you yourself who is angry with you, turning inward does not work because no matter how deep you go inside yourself, the angry you is still there.

Hmm. Depends, I think, on how much room there is to turn inwards.

“The monster-maker has become the monster.”

Wondered if he’d ever say it.