Book Review: "We Are the Crisis" by Cadwell Turnbull

 

4/5 stars 

*Spoiler alert!* 

We Are the Crisis continues Cadwell Turnbull’s amazing contemporary fantasy/horror series, the “Convergence” saga. I felt that the second volume was a bit disjointed with how much it jumped back and forth in time but am excited about what its events set up in the third book. (Otherwise, this book ended up in a hell of a cliffhanger that will haunt me for many days to come, all for nothing.) 

“How is it even possible to change a person by telling them a story?” 

The events of the second book begin with Laina, Ridley, and Rebecca on the road as monsters everywhere are being hunted. Especially after the Boston Massacre of monsters that ended No Gods, No Monsters set up a brewing civil war between humanity and monsters parallel to a rising pro-monster solidary movement.

 

Since monsters are an unknown quantity, they are feared. And fear has led to the rise of a human supremacist group known as the Black Hand. The Black Hand is suspected to have hunted the scattered remains of Rebecca’s pack and are actively infiltrating pro-monster advocacy groups (though the main characters don’t know that yet, but our omniscient narrator, Calvin, knows).

 

“All power is topography. All power tells you how to circumvent it if you study it long enough. Real power isn’t in the landscape. It is in the body and the mind that understands the landscape. We’re not beneath it, it is beneath us.” 

Some more minor characters are introduced, but the major lessons of the series so far, about the pervasiveness of evil and injustice in the world have remained largely unchanged. One particularly horrific, yet mundane evil (and blaring klaxon to the readers) was proposed legislation for monsters to carry around identification cards or markers to make themselves known. (The echoes of Nazi Germany here are obvious to anyone who knows, and acknowledges, the facts of history).

 

Not sure why, but I found the multiverse element to this interesting in how it was executed by Turnbull. At first, I was like, “not another multiverse,” but upon contemplating it more, I could see why it had a place in the story. The Earth with monsters on it is one of many Earths in which different choices were made and the laws of that universe slightly different. Midnight Library vibes, but with the horror element turned up to 100.  

While no book is perfect, I still appreciated the rawness and love in how Turnbull writes his characters and tells their stories. It was especially visible to me in We Are the Crisis, where it appears war is breaking out in an unsettled America and around the world.

 

The ending was quite the jump scare, but also a cliffhanger, so I need to know what happens next. In the interim, I will perhaps reread both No Gods, No Monsters and We Are the Crisis. It will be a long wait, but I’m sure it’ll be worth it.  

Happy reading! 

--BookOwl