Author: Lauren DeStefano

Publication Date: 02/21/2012

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Pages: 341

Source: Purchased

Rhine and Gabriel have escaped the mansion, but danger is never far behind.

Running away brings Rhine and Gabriel right into a trap, in the form of a twisted carnival whose ringmistress keeps watch over a menagerie of girls. Just as Rhine uncovers what plans await her, her fortune turns again. With Gabriel at her side, Rhine travels through an environment as grim as the one she left a year ago - surroundings that mirror her own feelings of fear and hopelessness.

The two are determined to get to Manhattan, to relative safety with Rhine’s twin brother, Rowan. But the road there is long and perilous - and in a world where young women only live to age twenty and young men die at twenty-five, time is precious. Worse still, they can’t seem to elude Rhine’s father-in-law, Vaughn, who is determined to bring Rhine back to the mansion...by any means necessary.

In the sequel to Lauren DeStefano’s harrowing Wither, Rhine must decide if freedom is worth the price - now that she has more to lose than ever.

 Rhine Ellery has escaped from the House Governor's mansion in Florida, and together with Gabriel, is en route to Manhattan to find her twin brother Rowan. Life on the outside is much different from the too-convenient mansion, and Rhine finds herself in the uncomfortable place of occasionally comparing her life within to the everyday struggles of the real world. Vacillating between anger at having been Gathered, being separated from her brother, and at the world for giving her this disease in the first place, Rhine learns that wanting something is important, but in this uncertain world where parents outlive their children, is that enough?

Fever starts almost immediately after the end of Wither, with Rhine and Gabriel on the run. The book begins with an exploratory feel, and I found myself having to reel back a bit after remembering the frenzied events at the end of the previous book. This hesitant tone fits well within Rhine's mindset as she reacclimatises to being on the outside. However, the two aren't alone for long before they find themselves ensnared in another situation of entrapment. I love what Lauren does with words - and what she isn't afraid to do with them - in order to convey Rhine's feelings of being caged and frustrated. (This is done at times to, what I feel, is the detriment of Gabriel - though he is always with Rhine, sometimes I don't get the feeling that he's there at all, a lack of presence.) The pacing of Fever runs parallel to Rhine figuring out her situation and how she's going to deal with it.

The issue for me, again, is that there's not enough information. I still don't know why this is happening, and that lack makes it difficult for me to suspend disbelief as much as I would like. We know there is a disease that affects all newly conceived children, and we know from haunting descriptions (the disappearance of the outer boroughs to the Atlantic is chilling for me as a New Yorker) that the Eastern seaboard and Europe are vastly redefined. These subtle descriptions do much in the way of setting the feeling for Rhine's America, but I still need to know how this disease came about. In order to affect children but not the parental hosts it has to be incredibly specific genetically. I also have difficulty accepting that people would readily embrace this new world instead of fighting and doing everything they can to find a cure.

We're introduced to a handful of new characters in this book, though I almost feel as if the characters were more inherent to the setting. Maddie, a physically handicapped child who does not speak, is perhaps the most telling. In Rhine's society such a child is dubbed 'malformed' and would ordinarily be killed. It continues to highlight what I found strange about Wither; that people would kill children when the existence of these children, even with their shortened lifespans, is all the human race has. Girls who aren't considered beautiful enough are killed by Gatherers and children who don't have ten fingers and ten toes are similarly considered disposable.

The main thing, aside from the lack of why, is that very little happens plot-wise here. I enjoyed the descriptions and the character movement, but I'm unsure as to how the series, with only one book left, will be able to tie everything together in a way that's going to be satisfying as a reader. Fever is a great development upon the first installment in that we get to see what exactly makes Rhine tick, and I'm curious to see how everything will unfold in the final book; curious enough that I'll pick it up when it's released.

"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly event courtesy of Breaking the Spine

that showcases much anticipated upcoming releases.

(goodreads 02/21/2012):

Running away brings Rhine and Gabriel right into a trap, in the form of a twisted carnival whose ringmistress keeps watch over a menagerie of girls. Just as Rhine uncovers what plans await her, her fortune turns again. With Gabriel at her side, Rhine travels through an environment as grim as the one she left a year ago - surroundings that mirror her own feelings of fear and hopelessness.


The two are determined to get to Manhattan, to relative safety with Rhine’s twin brother, Rowan. But the road there is long and perilous - and in a world where young women only live to age twenty and young men die at twenty-five, time is precious. Worse still, they can’t seem to elude Rhine’s father-in-law, Vaughn, who is determined to bring Rhine back to the mansion...by any means necessary.


In the sequel to Lauren DeStefano’s harrowing Wither, Rhine must decide if freedom is worth the price - now that she has more to lose than ever.

Wither is a book that the more I read, the more it grew on me. In fact, I've found myself wanting to re-read it lately, although perhaps I'll wait toward the end of the year as I wait for Fever. This is a story that, for me, could go in any number of directions, and that's the most exciting thing about it. I'm looking forward to meeting Rowan (possibly), seeing where Rhine ends up, and what happens when Linden figures everything out.

Secondly, I wasn't at all a fan of the cover when I first saw it but now I really like it. It's not stunning in the way that Wither's was, but it fits perfectly the title with it's ill-seeming tones of olive and yellow and a pose that seems lethargic and kept all at once. I also have a feeling that it's going to like 100 times better in person.

I'm...really excited for this one.

Author: Lauren DeStefano

Publication Date: 03/22/2011

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Pages: 358

Source: Library

 Synopsis: 

Thanks to modern science, every human being has become a ticking genetic time bomb—males only live to age twenty-five, and females only live to age twenty. In this bleak landscape, young girls are kidnapped and forced into polygamous marriages to keep the population from dying out.
When sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery is taken by the Gatherers to become a bride, she enters a world of wealth and privilege. Despite her husband Linden's genuine love for her, and a tenuous trust among her sister wives, Rhine has one purpose: to escape—to find her twin brother and go home. But Rhine has more to contend with than losing her freedom. Linden's eccentric father is bent on finding an antidote to the genetic virus that is getting closer to taking his son, even if it means collecting corpses in order to test his experiments. With the help of Gabriel, a servant Rhine is growing dangerously attracted to, Rhine attempts to break free, in the limited time she has left. (goodreads)

Maybe it's a little strange to start with the book design, but that's what really caught my eye the first time I saw this book. The design is gorgeous and the sequence of girl, ring, caged bird is a perfect summation of one aspect of the story. What really got me was that when you turn to the copyright page the shapes and lines continue. It says that...Lizzy Bromley did the artwork, so, fantastic job to you! 

I am of two minds with this book. The part of me that suspended disbelief (and protest) at the idea of young girls being stolen, forced into marriages, polygamous or not, and trapped sort of fell in line with Rhine's thinking and was inherently opposed to everything, but came to sort of see how it could all happen and how Rhine would want to protect her new sisters. I see this as part Stockholm Syndrome, part cultural norms for her society as a way to keep the race afloat. After living with people for so long you become attached, and through Rhine I came to partially understand that. Part of that understanding was DeStefano's way of really getting across Rhine's inner voice, which was distinct and different from a lot of female characters that I've read. A lot of it had to do with word choice and style, and it carried across with all of the three sister wives and their manner of speaking. 

The rational part of me, however, had a huge problem with it much like I did with Bumped. Rhine was captured with maybe a dozen or so other girls, and only three including herself were selected. The rest were killed, which seems silly if the whole point of stealing women in the first place is to procreate. Call me cynical, but I almost wonder if Linden's father has an antidote but just relishes his power over others and refuses to change things. Aside from the kidnapping and forced relationships, there was apparently a third world war, seemingly nuclear, that destroyed everything except North America, leaving the rest of the world under water. I had a hard time with this... and all of the snow in Florida (the result of too much war). The world building outside of the mansion where Rhine lives is scarce, while life inside the mansion is detailed rather well to the point where I could envision daily life for its inhabitants.

Can we talk about Linden for a moment? Linden, Rhine's husband and House Governor, is someone I was completely prepared to dislike immensely. Any person that decides to keep forced wives for himself is a bit horrific, and so I read his character like I was marching into battle. However, I was surprised to find him incredibly naïve and almost childlike in some ways. Linden is almost as much a victim of his father as the rest of the wives are. The way he climbed into bed with the girls reminded me of a child who had had a nightmare and was too afraid to sleep by themselves. Linden is quiet and soft-spoken, but smart and artistic in an almost endearing way that suggests he knows nothing about how his wives came to him in the first place. And so I don't love Linden, but I can understand him, much like I can understand Rhine's situation.

I liked but did not love this book. It took some work on my part because it touched on some ideas that are hard to set aside even while reading, but given the premise, I think it was done rather well although the world needs to be explained some more. It's definitely a book that will raise some discussion which is not necessarily a bad thing and I'll be adding the sequel to my Goodreads queue.