Jan 29

Jan 29 Hell Bent (Alex Stern, #2)

Author: Leigh Bardugo
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

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Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

***Description is a spoiler for Ninth House***

Find a gateway to the underworld. Steal a soul out of hell. A simple plan, except people who make this particular journey rarely come back. But Galaxy “Alex” Stern is determined to break Darlington out of purgatory―even if it costs her a future at Lethe and at Yale.

Forbidden from attempting a rescue, Alex and Dawes can’t call on the Ninth House for help, so they assemble a team of dubious allies to save the gentleman of Lethe. Together, they will have to navigate a maze of arcane texts and bizarre artifacts to uncover the societies’ most closely guarded secrets, and break every rule doing it. But when faculty members begin to die off, Alex knows these aren’t just accidents. Something deadly is at work in New Haven, and if she is going to survive, she’ll have to reckon with the monsters of her past and a darkness built into the university’s very walls.

Thick with history and packed with Bardugo’s signature twists, Hell Bent brings to life an intricate world full of magic, violence, and all too real monsters.

TL;DR Review

Hell Bent was an awesome sequel to Ninth House. I loved diving deeper into these characters and their relationships, all while happily along for the plot ride Leigh Bardugo is famous for.

For you if: You like dark fantasy/academia (and already read Ninth House).

Full Review

Hell Bent is the long-awaited, much-anticipated sequel to Ninth House. It’s the second book in the Alex Stern trilogy (although until I read this book I totally thought this was a duology 😅) , an adult dark academia/fantasy series about Yale’s secret societies by our queen, Leigh Bardugo.

We knew from Ninth House that this was going to be a wild ride, and it definitely didn’t disappoint. No spoilers here, but I will say that the story picks up a few months after the last book ended. And whereas Ninth House was more of a world/character introduction by way of mystery (“what happened to Darlington?”), Hell Bent is all about deepening our relationship with those characters while we ride along on the unputdownable plot journey Leigh is famous for (“OK, so how do we save him?”).

I loved getting more time with our motley little crew: fierce but loving Mercy; soft but strong Dawes; moral but loyal Turner. I also felt like Alex kept her badass, unapologetic nature while also growing a bit more mature, but in a way that felt organic for us as we’ve gotten to know her. And of course, Leigh’s skill at using a non-linear timeline to keep us engaged and guessing without making things confusing was on full display.

So the good news is that this was totally worth the wait. But the even better news is that it doesn’t look like we’ll have to wait as long between books 2 and 3, because she’s already hard at work on the finale.

And finally, for those of you who’ve already read this, I’ll just say: glow sticks. #IYKYK.