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Series Review: The Brothers Sinister by Courtney Milan

Greetings and welcome to Reviews That Burn: Series Reviews, part of Books That Burn. Series Reviews discuss at least three books in a series and cover the overarching themes and development of the story across several books. This review is for The Brothers Sinister by Courtney Milan. Full Audio Here   The Governess Affair Miss Serena Barton intends to hold the petty, selfish duke who had her sacked responsible for his crimes. But the man who handles all the duke's dirty business has been ordered to get rid of her by fair means or foul. She’ll have to prove more than his match… The Duchess War The last time Minerva Lane was the center of attention, it ended badly—so badly that she changed her name to escape her scandalous past. So when a handsome duke comes to town, the last thing she wants is his attention. But that is precisely what she gets... A Kiss for Midwinter Miss Lydia Charingford does her best to forget the dark secret that nearly ruined her life, hiding it beneath her smi...

Animorphs Book 12: The Reaction by K. A. Applegate

The Reaction uses the premise of an allergic reaction to build a nice twist on the usual mission formula. Alienation and being unable/unwilling to open up is a major theme, and we see an extreme example of Rachel's drive to solve everything herself.

I like how the books show you that conversations have happened which readers are not privy to. We first learned the term "nothlit" when Ax was narrating, and now Rachel knows it because at some point Ax must have explained. The reader has already learned it, so we don't need some extra scene where Ax passes the info along. When the books are so short, you really need world-building and implied events like that to ride the line between storytelling and info-dumping. Also little things like how when Rachel is relaying what someone else said she uses words that convey the emotion of what they said, rather than just quoting what happened a few pages/hours ago. If the quotative like had been a thing when these books were written, Rachel would use it all the time.

Wow, the creatures Visser Three morphs are amazing. It's not great for the Animorphs when he's involved, but it's a chance to get snippets of other alien life in the series even if the implications are terrible for the creatures in question.

A girl (Rachel) turns into a crocodile

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