Review: Sparks Rise (The Darkest Minds #2.5) by Alexandra Bracken!

Spoiler Alert: This is book 2.5!  Use your Judgement!

Don’t miss the thrilling novella that connects the last two novels in the New York Times best-selling Darkest Minds trilogy.

Sam didn’t think things could get worse at Thurmond rehabilitation camp. Then the Reds arrive. Everyone assumed the kids with firepower had been killed years ago. Instead they were taken away, brainwashed, and returned as terrifyingly effective guards. To her horror, Sam recognizes one of them: Lucas, the one spark of light in Sam’s dark childhood. Lucas has a deadly secret–he beat the brutal training that turned his fellow Reds into mindless drones. When Sam defends herself against an attack by a vile PSF guard and faces a harrowing punishment, Lucas must risk his everything to save her.

Includes a bonus preview chapter from the final Darkest Minds novel, In the Afterlight.

Description taken from Goodreads

My Review

I am a mess.  I’m a pile of goo.  Alexandra Bracken definitely knows how to write a novella. 

As much as I loved Sparks Rise, I hated it just as much.  It was just so painful to read.  I love how with each book we get some kind of new perspective of this world.  In The Darkest Minds we were introduced to everything but mostly we were on the run.  In In Time we saw it from a skip tracers POV and then in Never Fade from the League.  In Sparks Rise, we were back in Thurmond.  And it was awful.  We get so much more of it than we did in The Darkest Minds.  It’s such a horrific place and I really hope that it, along with all of the other camps, burn to the ground in In the Afterlight.

In this novella we’re with Sam, Ruby’s old friend.  She’s definitely a fighter and very different from Ruby.  Ruby’s a fighter as well but she had to adapt into who she is now because of her circumstances.  Sam was always a little rebel and I love that.  She’s no princess, she’s a knight.  Definitely a great role model.

Lucas was also great.  I’m still a Liam girl but Lucas is pretty awesome.  His need to find his sister and to save Sam is so commendable.

It was really interesting to see a bit more of the Reds, as well.  We haven’t seen much of them except for snippets and bits and pieces here and there.  I know that they’ll probably play an even bigger role in In the Afterlight.

So, I need some kind of conclusion to this novella as well as for In Time in In the Afterlight because both of these novellas left you on a cliffhanger and I am not okay with it staying that way.  I want everything tied in a neat little bow and handed to us on a bright silver platter.  I need a happy ending for this one!  I need it like I need air!  Like I need books!

Characters 5/5

Plot 4.5/5

Feels 5+/5

Writing 5/5

Overall 4.9/5

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