I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

King's Crusade is the second book in the Seventeen series.

I recently read and reviewed Soul Meaning, the first book in the Seventeen series, and quite enjoyed it. So when this title came up on Netgalley as well, I was very pleased and requested it straight away. And though this book takes place in the same world (the same two races of 'immortals') it's a completely different book than the first... Except for the gunfire/fighting, there's still plenty of that...

For one, the characters are different. This books is about Alexa King, an important Crovir, whereas the first book focused on the half-blood Bastian-Crovir-hybrid (snowflake) Lucas Soul. Not that Alexa isn't special of course. Three hundred years and she still has to suffer her first dead.

The point is that the Immortals aren't truly immortal (it would make a very boring war that way), but can survive up to sixteen (mostly violent deaths). Except for Lucas, who can kill immortals immediately 'when he feels like it'. Oh, and there has been a great plague, similar to the Black Death, that killed a lot of the immortals and you'll be reminded about this every thirty pages or so.

This book basically reads like a Dan Brown novel (the fantasy-aspect, which isn't really big anyway, only starts at the end of the story) which is good, I guess, if you like that kind of story, but for me it was a little disappointment. When you've read one, you've kind of read them all. Please let me take you to some of the evidence on display:

• Harvard Professor
• Something old has been discovered
• Something has been stolen
• Secret Sect
• Discount trip to the Vatican
• Religion
• Codes
• Travelling through all of Europe in approximately one day

The evidence is quite strong here. It's the main reason why I liked this book less than the first one. But also because I was hoping to find answers for the questions I still had after the first book, and that weren't in this book either. The third book is also on my to-read-soon-list, so that review will be coming up somewhere in the next month I think...

[I got a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

3.5 stars. I had read and reviewed the first installment a couple of months ago, and I liked this one a little better. The action-to-revelations ratio seemed better paced to me, and didn't leave me with the same dizzying sensation as Soul Meaning did. There is a lot of action—the characters are, after all, up against a sect that doesn't hesitate to shoot whoever gets in the way, and whose arm reaches several countries—but I thought it felt more compact, and put to better use. It might be confusing sometimes, in that the author describes various kinds of moves, so if a reader doesn't know those terms, picturing said moves could be difficult; fortunately, it wasn't a problem for me (at least those Body Combat classes taught me the names of various kinds of kicks). I keep thinking that, just like Book #1, King's Crusade would make a good action movie.

At first, I wasn't sure about what to think of the conspiracy/archaeology side, because it's been played a lot in so many stories already. On the other hand, though it's a bit cliché, I do enjoy my dose of sexy-looking archaeology geek professors who find themselves embroiled in secret societies wars.

Speaking of which, I liked Jackson as a character. In the beginning, I was afraid he'd turned some kind of womanizer (when Alexa recruits him, he's in bed with a woman), but it quickly appeared that once on the job, he'd do it seriously, and involve himself even though things were clearly dangerous. He's in in for the money, the mystery, the scientific/historical interest, not for the nookie. Neither he nor Alexa let themselves get distracted by feelings in the middle of a fight, and proved to be competent in their respective fields. As for Alexa, she knew what she had to do, she did it well, and she was the no-nonsense kind of character I like.

What dampened my enthusiasm:

- We don't get to know Alexa that well. What I mean is that she's got a bit of an amnesia thing going, although it's only when it comes to her early childhood; and I would've liked to find out what happened to her, what led to the events of the prologue, before Dimitri found her.
- I don't really agree with the ending.

- Sometimes the characters were a bit... too competent? For instance, early enough, we learn that Alexa has never died, contrary to all the other immortals, and

I couldn't decide between giving it 3 or 4 stars. I'm giving it 3 on Goodreads—well, I did like it—but if the points I've raised aren't a bother for you, definitely consider it a 4.