Mediocre Mable's "Meh" (The Lost Saint)

Review of The Lost Saint, by Bree Despain. (Please read the first book, The Dark Divine before reading this review as it may contain spoilers!!)

Quickie: An enjoyable book for sure, but not quite as wonderful as I'd hoped.

Full:
From the back cover: "They're coming for you," a muffled voice said over the phone. "You're in danger. You're all in danger. You can't stop them."
"Who is this?" I asked, panic rising with the tension in my muscles.
"You can't trust him." The voice on the line seemed suddenly clearer  like the hand covering the receiver had moved out of the way- and the familiarity of it made my heart nearly stop. "Please, Gracie, listen to me this time. You're all in danger. You have to know that--" The voice cut off with a clatter, like the phone had been dropped, and the line went dead. 
"Jude!" I shouted. 


What I liked: I honestly wasn't quite sure who to trust. Grace's boyfriend Daniel has started keeping things from her, and he knows she knows he's not telling her everything. He's hanging out at shady places with no explanation, he's pulling away from Grace, and he's making obvious lies about his whereabouts when he disappears for days at a time.

Then there's Talbot, Grace's unlikely hero. (Or maybe not at all unlikely, who can say?) Talbot happens to be at a club when Grace's friend April gets roughed up by a man and Talbot rescues them both. Then Grace runs into him again at a community service project her Religion class is doing. They keep bumping into each other and soon an odd relationship is formed. Grace can't help but feel a bit guilty (it's obvious that there could be something between Talbot and Grace) for hanging out with Talbot when she should be hanging out with her boyfriend... but her boyfriend hasn't exactly been around, has he?

Then there's Gabriel. The last of the Saint Moons. He's visiting from one of the big wolf packs and is generally surrounded in mystery. He seems nice, but he keeps warning Grace away from things she's pursuing and she can't tell if he's in all this for good or bad.

I loved trying to figure out who the "him" was that Grace shouldn't trust. There were so many men who it could apply to. Didn't help that all of them were being simultaneously trustworthy and not trustworthy. But hey, I love a good mystery.

I also like the end. Good action that progressed the story at a pace I could get down with. Things finally got really interesting at the end.

What I didn't like: Dude, can we say communication fail?? A lot of Grace's troubles could have been averted had she and Daniel been open about things. I realize this is essential to the plot... but it drives me nuts to see a couple hitting their own self-destruct button in fiction. I just want to smack them both.

I felt like it dragged out. Eeek! Maybe this is just me. It probably is. But I felt that the middle was just too long. Things were happening, sure, but it was mostly the same things. Grace making bad decisions and thinking she's invincible, trying to figure out who to trust.

As I said, I liked the book. It just didn't 'wow' me as much as The Dark Divine. I'll read the next book, but I hope it's a bit better.

3.5 out of 5 stars.