In the Forests of the Night

In the Forests of the Night (The Goblin Wars book 2) by Kersten Hamilton
ARC provided by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company
Description from Goodreads:
Teagan, Finn, and Aiden have made it out of Mag Mell alive, but the Dark Man's forces are hot on their heels. Back in Chicago, Tea’s goblin cousins show up at her school, sure she will come back to Mag Mell, as goblin blood is never passive once awoken. Soon she will belong to Fear Doirich and join them. In the meantime, they are happy to entertain themselves by trying to seduce, kidnap, or kill Tea’s family and friends.
Teagan knows she doesn’t have much time left, and she refuses to leave Finn or her family to be tortured and killed. A wild Stormrider, born to rule and reign, is growing stronger inside her. But as long as she can hold on, she’s still Teagan Wylltson, who plans to be a veterinarian and who heals the sick and hurting. The disease that’s destroying her—that’s destroying them all—has a name: Fear Doirich.
And Teagan Wylltson is not going to let him win.

My take:
I was so excited to receive an advanced reader copy of the latest book in The Goblin Wars series by Kersten Hamilton. Tyger Tyger was such a pleasant surprise for me. My original review can be found here.

In the second installment of this series, In the Forests of the Night, the reader is quickly plunged into the aftermath of Teagan's first trip into Mag Mell. Her father is back home, but he has lost some of his memories. The house is full of family - both human and goblin. Teagan's friend Abby is now living with them as are Roisin and Grendal as well as Thomas. The story is very fast-paced and pulls you along into the world of Mab, Fear Doirich and the Mac Cumhaill.

Not only is the story exciting and tension filled, there is a lot of humor as well. That is one of the many things I like about this series. There is a funny scene about when Roisin finds out that Thomas, who is a shape-shifter, is not the sexy animal he claimed, but a bird instead. It's just not the same as, say, a wolf.

As a literature major, I used to sit in pubs with other students and discuss literature - yes, really. And one of our favorite topics was the Shakespeare issue. Who was Shakespeare, exactly? This was never taken too seriously, but it was so much fun!  And to my joy, this topic is discussed in the book --- with some interesting information provided by Thomas, the Lhiannon-sidhe - Celtic muse. Another thing I loved was that while just reading for fun, I was inspired to research several topics of mythology, read authors I had never actually read but should have, re-read some authors, learn about Irish Travellers and re-read Tyger Tyger to make sure I had everything all straight in my head.

After I read In the Forests of the Night, I gave my daughter Tyger Tyger to read and after she finished it, she confiscated my copy of In the Forests of the Night. She loved them both and was only upset that she would have to wait for the next book.

This is one series that I consistently and often recommend to my friends and other homeschoolers who have tweens/teens. Teagan is a smart girl and she makes her own decisions. I love the depth of mythology and literature within the books and I know that my own kids will be inspired to read more and research for more information after reading them. I hope that other readers will be inspired to do so as well.