480 pages
Expected publication: March 17th 2020 by Skyscape
The electric heir is the sequel of the brilliant and amazing The fever king in the Feverwake duology.
SPOILERS AHEAD
TW
https://victorialeewrites.com/2019/10…
PLOT
The electric heir starts six months after the ending of The Fever King. After Noam helped overthrow the goverment of Carolinia, the Atlantians became citizens and Lehrer chancellor.
But Noam remembers everything Lehrer did, with the magic, to Dara and he’s ready to do anything to bring him down, even playing the double agent, tricking Lehrer to think he’s on his side. When Dara, who Noam thought dead, returns to Carolinia, without his magic, stripped away by the same vaccine it saved his life, both of them are forced to play a dangerous game to bring Lehrer to justice and save their country.
And themselves.
MY THOUGHTS
This book is raw and brutal and so hard to read. Victoria Lee poured her heart in this duology, talking about suffering, abuse and survivors. It’s a book about survivors and surviving.
Dara and Noam’s abuser is charismatic and powerful, persuasive and sick and it was so painful to read how Noam struggled to see what is happening to him as an abuse, as a violence.
He’s so manipulate by Lehrer, so involved into this big game he has trouble realizing he’s a victim. Both Noam and Dara fight to recover and call things by their name, during the book and after.
It was hard to read both of them feeling shame and guilt and blaming theirselves for others’ sins and I love how Ames was such an amazing friend, ready to open their eyes and pushing them to see the truth.
In The electric heir Lehrer’s policy is still brutal and Noam and Dara chose to fight with the Black Magnolia, a rebellion movement, looking for a way to kill an immortal human being, while Lehrer continued his power climbing, using the IV teenager as weapons, Noam included.
Noam found himself playing a double role, a spy for the resistance, living with Lehrer, faking it to be still under his persuasion (the Faraday cage helped him to protect himself and to remember everything Lehrer did to Carolinia, the virus and to Dara) and aiding the resistance.
It was hard to think about how was hurt and manipulated by Lehrer, how twisted Lehrer’s mind could be, forcing Noam into a parody of a couple, when Noam is seventeen and under his power. It was difficult to read, too, when Dara confessed to Ames that Lehrer first and then Ames’ father raped him, when he still thought and yearned for Lehrer’s affection, before he realized the truth.
Reading about Noam trapped in this big scheme was absolutely chilling, how determined he was, despite the dangers how being there with Lehrer, to destroy him, to find a solution against him, to avenge Dara.
In The electric heir we have two POVs, reading Dara’s for the first time. I loved his POV’s, it was brilliant and interesting reading about his thoughts and feelings.
Like in The fever king, Victoria Lee’s writing style is intense and powerful, so captivating I could feel Dara’s anxiety, his feeling powerless without his power, forced to hiding because Lehrer was looking for him and his being worried for Noam.
The relationship between Noam and Dara is incredibly complex in The electric heir. They are both victim, both struggling with the notion of abuse and powerlessness. I loved how Dara decided, thanks to the QZ, to stop drinking and I was so anguished to read how him and Ames were so self-destructive, trying to feel the hollowness and pain with booze, drugs and sex.
In Dara’s and Noam’s relationship there is hurt, betrayal, resentment and so much love and affection. During the book they still want and love each other and Dara hated seeing Noam with Lehrer, so in danger to be hurt, raped or killed. Reading about Dara and Noam being raped and hit was so awful.
I felt so involved, my heart was beating so fast, screaming against the brutality, the unfairness.
It was painful reading how both Dara and Noam thought they wanted to have sex with Lehrer, to consent to that, craving for his attention, manipulated by him.
Before meeting Dara again at the gala, Noam felt guilty because he abandoned him and he spent six months thinking he was dead. His pain, his guilt and anguish were incredibly written. He got close to Lehrer for this reason, too and only after talking with Dara, Noam realized Lehrer had his eyes on him since the beginning.
It was awful, heartbreaking to read how Noam was stressed and tense, refusing to have sex with Lehrer, starting to realized their relationship, since Dara is back. Difficult to read his denial, almost until the end, when Lehrer almost killed him because he refused him.
I really loved this book, it was a difficult read because it’s impossible not to love these characters (Except Lehrer, even though he is a complex character and not the usual flat villain of the story).
I loved the way the author talked about surviving and survivors, calling things by their names, talking about rape. Both Noam and Dara are survivors and they experience lots of feelings, like shame, guilt, powerlessness, denial. The reader is able to follow them struggling with their feelings and, above all Noam, realizing what is happening to them.
Both Dara and Noam are abused by the same man, Lehrer, but they experience and react to the abuse in a different way. Dara was abused, physically, sexually, psychologically by his adoptive father, while Noam was involved, coerced, manipulated into an abusive relationship, a parody of a couple. Dara reacts in a self-destructive way, drinking, partying, having sex with strangers, Noam, at least in the beginning, can’t see or don’t want to realize what is happening to him as an abuse.
Both of them has to come to term with their abuse, they went through hell, feeling shame, guilt and powerlessness, and it was great and moving reading about their friends, new and old, supporting and helping them. I loved Ames, Bethany and Taye (I’d love more Taye scenes since he’s really cool), their friendships, their wanting to protect each other.
THE WRITING
This book made my heart beat faster in more than one occasion, I have to say. Victoria Lee’s writing style is powerful and intense. Her characters are complex, real, authentic and the story is gripping and it leave you bleeding, in a very good way. They are brimming with life, anger, love, hope, rage and reading about them being hurt and scared was a punch in the gut.
I was so involved, I felt everything. I was scared, I was angry, I felt Noam’s and Dara’s pain, shame, love, guilt, hope, rage.
It was emotional, raw and it wrecked me completely.
I was so captivated, so caught in the story I couldn’t stop reading and hoping for the best. It’s full of angst, revelations, truths and plot twists and I absolutely loved the final chapter, when everything comes to an end in a perfect way.
It’s not saying they will never have nightmares and traumas, but it’s saying it’s possible to heal and move on. I loved seeing Dara and Noam together after all the things they have been through, living together, helping each other through the bad times, Dara cooking and showing Noam the constellations.
Beautiful book, raw, painful and so necessary.
I don’t think I will stop freaking out about this book, because I’ve been obsessed about it for months, since October. And about The Fever king since March, so…TOMORROW IS THE BIG DAY! The electric heir will come out to the world and you shouldn’t miss this amazing and intense book!
https://www.bookdepository.com/Electric-Heir-Victoria-Lee/9781542005081
Lu is lost in books 