Review--A Beautiful Evil by Kelly Keaton

A POWER SHE CAN'T DENY.

A DESTINY SHE'S DETERMINED TO FIGHT.

When Ari first arrived in the dilapidated city of New 2, all she wanted was to figure out who she was. But what she discovered was beyond her worst nightmare. Ari is a descendant of Medusa and can already sense the evil growing inside her--a power the goddess Athena will stop at nothing to possess.

Desperate to hold on to her humanity and protect her loved ones, Ari must fight back. But Athena's playing mind games, not just with Ari but with those Ari cares about most. And Athena has a very special plan for the brooding and sexy Sebastian.

Ari is determined to defeat Athena, but time is running out. With not other options, Ari must unleash the very thing she's afraid of: herself.


Okay, so it's been a vastly long time since I last read Kelly Keaton's Darkness Becomes Her, I read that as an e-ARC back when I was getting newsletters for such things from Simon & Schuster. So I basically have no memory of what went down! But luckily, A Beautiful Evil does a nice job of summing it all up--the important details anyway.

Ari is in training, trying to learn how to control and use her powers, which is easier said than done since she's a descendant of Medusa and once she reaches 21 she will be in full power, and basically in killing mode. But really the only person she wants to kill is Athena. Athena still has her father and young Violet held prisoner, and Ari will do anything to get them back.

That's pretty much the gist of the storyline, Ari trying to control and harness her powers and use them to get her family back. It was still an enjoyable read, one that could've been done in a day, but I got busy with things once I got home. Moving on...I really enjoyed this one despite not having read the first one in so long. It was almost like meeting the characters again for the first time, yet still knowing them on some basic level.

Sebastian was totally awesome! Of course finding out that he is a warlock vampire was a shock, even though it was likely mentioned in book 1, my memory failed me there! Ari is a gorgon, so yeah, things were pretty exciting! There were a few sparks still between Ari and Sebastian, but they get so busy and caught up with trying to find and defeat Athena, that there's hardly time for romance. There are just a few tender moments between them that were sweet though. A kind of tension still remained from last time though, once they find out that Ari is a gorgon and potential god-killer, it caused Sebastian and the rest of the gang to freak out a bit. Except for Violet of course.

Watching Ari grow into her powers is definitely interesting. She learns more about them in this one and how when used in a certain way, something even more surprising can happen!

Things get intense when Ari, Sebastian and Henri go to Athena's temple in a rescue attempt, which naturally doesn't go as planned. There were some close calls that had my heart racing! Athena is definitely one wicked witch! I always find it intriguing with books that have Greek mythology woven in, like with the gods and goddesses and seeing how different they are in each book! Athena is a nightmare here, yet in Aimee Carter's trilogy, she wasn't half bad if memory serves me correctly.

This was basically a very entertaining and fun read! I love the city of New 2 and seeing how different it is from the now--not that I've ever been there but hope to one day! I recognize some spots Ari visits, from word of mouth or travel shows and it's all fun! Even seeing some of the scarier parts with the reveants and other nasties crawling the streets, it gets the blood pumping! This is definitely one heart pounding series I plan to keep!


Overall Rating 4.5/5 stars