Rage and Ruin by Jennifer L. Armentrout | ARC Review

Title: Rage and Ruin

Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout

Series: The Harbinger #2

Genre: New Adult, Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Romance, Paranormal

Publisher: Inkyard Press

Publication date: June 9th, 2020

Pages: 596

My rating:

A half human, half angel and her bonded gargoyle protector must work with demons to stop the apocalypse while avoiding falling in love. The Harbinger is coming…but who or what is it? All of humankind may fall if Trinity and Zayne can’t win the race against time as dark forces gather.

As tensions rise, they must stay close together and patrol the DC streets at night, seeking signs of the Harbinger, an entity that is killing Wardens and demons with no seeming rhyme or reason. Forbidden to be with each other, Zayne and Trinity fight their feelings and turn to unusual sources for help—the demon Roth and his cohorts. But as deaths pile up and they uncover a sinister plot involving the local high school and endangering someone dear to Zayne, Trin realizes she is being led…herded…played for some unknown end. As anger builds and feelings spiral out of control, it becomes clear that rage may be the ruin of them all.

“Listening to them had been my greatest weakness. Not my vision. Not my feelings or my fear. I shoukdb0t ever allow things to escalate to the last resort. I should never be in a position like this when I could’ve prevented it.”

Wow, I honestly cannot believe how I survived this book. Even though this book was one of my most anticipated releases of 2020, and I knew I was going to enjoy it since I’m such a big Jennifer L. Armentrout fan, I didn’t expect to end up as mad as I was, because no one told me this would end in such a cliffhanger and I would have to wait another year for the third book to come out. Still, I had so much fun reading this sequel, and I’m counting the days until I have the third and final book in my hands.

I think my only complain about Rage and Ruin was the beginning. It was a very long book and I feel in the first 15% not much really happened. It’s true that I remembered less than I thought when I started reading it, so it was nice to see a recap of what happened in the first installment, but I think that could have been done in the first couple of chapters, and then the plot started.

However, I think that despite all that, Rage and Ruin ended up being such a fast paced novel with lots of action packed scenes, which I absolutely adored. I was so pleasantly surprised by how descriptive they were, till’ the point where I could picture everything that was happening in my mind. They kept me at the edge of my seat, wanting to know how they were going to end, because the mystery was killing me and I wanted answers.

Another thing that I really appreciated was that the author delved much more in the characters’ arcs and their backstories. There was a lot of information about the original Dark Elements series that I didn’t remember, so it was nice to get to know these friendships again. I also really enjoyed Trin’s arc a lot, and overall her evolution throughout this book, because even though in the first installment we got to see a little bit that development, I think in this second book she was put to the test and gone trough more that made her grow as a character.

“I was a Trueborn. and a kick-ass fighter. But I was still disabled at the end of the night. And I knew that didn’t define me. It wasn’t the sum of who I was. It was just a part of me.”

Zayne was also another character I was pleasantly surprised by. Though I liked him in the first book, there was something about his actions or his personality that didn’t blow me away, but I have to say that in Rage and Ruin I was a big fan of him. We got to see a softer and romantic side of him, and let me tell you, I ended up loving how immersive he was in taking care of Trin and making sure she was alright and happy, and we stan.

The only thing I wasn’t the biggest fan of was the miscommunication part that happened in the middle of the story. I know it created tons of drama and it was angsty to read Trin’s thoughts about how she was dealing with that, but I just don’t really understand that trope, and I never like it when it appears in books, so this was no different. They could have talked as adults and solved the problems they had with each other instead of dragging it more than 20% of the story, but once that was being solved, I adored the outcome.

And wow, that ending. Even though I was so right about that big revelation about who the Harbinger was, that last chapter honestly killed me. I don’t know what I was expecting to happen, but that just wasn’t it, and now I have to wait another year to know how that was possible (I have some theories, tho).

Overall, I really enjoyed Rage and Ruin and I think it was such an interesting and well done sequel. Though the beginning was a little bit slow, the pacing got so much better as I kept reading, and I really enjoyed not only seeing this cast of characters’ journey, but also getting some cameos from the OG series, which I adored.

I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. This doesn’t change my opinion whatsoever. All thoughts are my own.