BOOK REVIEW: Crushed by Eliza Crewe

BOOK REVIEW: Crushed by Eliza Crewe

Amazon
October 2014
eBook, £2.94
Reviewed by Aly Locatelli

8/10

I am Meda Melange, demon-saint monster girl. I make full-grown men scream in terror. I break bones and drain blood. I turn nightmares into reality.
I am the most powerful creature on earth. I do not wear a leash.

For a while, Crushed seemed to be suffering with Middle Book Syndrome – when a sequel tries hard to live up to the amazingness of its predecessor but doesn’t quite manage it. However, it wasn’t long before Crewe’s magic started taking effect and Crushed became an action-packed, exhilarating sequel that had this reader sitting on the edge of her seat.

No, Meda, you can’t leave campus.
No, Meda, you know we have a curfew.
No, Meda, you can’t eat that guy.

Meda is a ‘free prisoner’ at the Crusader’s new school/campsite. Where before she was “one of them” (mostly because they didn’t know who she was at the time) she is now being watched like a hawk, stalked and reprimanded at every turn, only fed when they say so, but is, at least, free to roam the school. Before curfew. It doesn’t matter if she’s truly innocent because people — especially Jo — constantly remind her to, “Be good, Meda.” And for a half-demon-half-Crusader, this feat is proving harder than she expected. In fact, Jo has made it her personal mission to mother Meda.

She rounds on me. “Well?” she demands, hands on hips. “Do you have anything to say for yourself?” She looks at me expectantly.
“Gee, you’re pretty when you’re angry.”

Of course, Meda will take none of Jo’s rubbish, and continues to run around, wreaking havoc as she pleases… even if she does have particularly good intentions behind those terrible actions. Jo and Meda’s friendship not only strengthens throughout this book, but is also put to the test. As someone who reads a lot of Young Adult, I always find it hard to believe when friendships are perfect through and through, because, whether you like it or not, you cannot keep your best friend happy day in and day out. One day, you’re going to do something that’ll annoy her/him big time and vice versa.

“You treat living here like a joke.” She hasn’t turned back to me. “You float along, barely civil, and act like they owe you. You act like they should be grateful the Great Meda Melange didn’t kill them today. You want them to treat you like a Crusader?” Now she does look at me. “Then stop acting like a demon.”

As friendships are tested, Meda finds herself drawn more and more to the beautifully handsome French demon boy she met whilst she was imprisoned in Cracked — Armand.
And yes, ladies and gentlemen, the half-demon, half-Crusader has raging hormones just like any other teenage girl.

So when the sexy Frenchman offers her a way out, she can’t possibly say no. As she says, a good girl’s weakness is always a bad boy.

But he turns those long-lashed eyes on me, full of entreaty, as if he were saying: please, please let me come murder the molester with you. How do you say “no” to eyes like those? They are the magical combination of sex and puppy.
Better than it sounds, I promise.

But don’t let this trick you into thinking that there’s going to be an abundance of insta-love, dry humping and kissing in dark, rotten corners of the school. Far from it. They’re so devilishly good together that you don’t quite realise that what they’re forming is friendship. Crewe deftly handled the most overused, popular trope of today, the feared insta-love, because I can honestly say there is none. It was all so real, I could almost punch them in the face.

In a good way.

Get him! My hormones scream.
Don’t fall for it, my brain cautions.
Pretty! They whine.
Calm down, hormones. We are just pumping him – (really brain, you chose the word pumping?) – for information. He is literally evil. We need to keep our distance.
A pause.
Get him!
Sigh.

Because there is a greater threat on the horizon. A treaty has been broken and now the demons and Crusaders are at war. The greatest prize in the eyes of one side, or threat best eliminated according to the other? Meda.

Together, Meda and Armand jump on a crazy train to crazyville, with Jo and Chi not far behind.

And it’s not going to be pretty.

Although it had, for this reader, a rocky start, once I got over that hurdle I sped through the book as if my life depended on it. In some sense, it did. I needed to know what happened next and, just like with Cracked, I wasn’t going to sleep until I had all the answers. Every time you think you can breathe, there’s a new surprise that screams “BOO!” the minute you let your guard down. The action/fight scenes were incredibly well executed, to the point I found myself giggling and intrigued rather than mind-numbingly bored or completely disinterested.

I have always felt that Meda and I are two peas in a pod. She’s one of those characters you either want to be, adopt… or kidnap, which is always an option if they don’t want to be adopted, of course.

*shifty eyes*

10/10 would recommend, and if you haven’t yet read Cracked, I honestly do not know what you’re waiting for. This series is amazing.

Crushed is Book 2 in the Soul Eaters trilogy.

Steph’s review of Cracked – Book 1

Aly’s review of Crossed – Book 3

Category: Book Reviews, Other Reviews