Thunderhead is the second book in the Arc of the Scythe series. If you haven’t yet, be sure to check out my review of the first book Scythe.
Thunderhead picks up shortly after Scythe left off without a lot of recap, so it’s definitely recommended that this series be read in order. I’m happy that this was my first book finished in 2020. I have a lot to say about this book, but I’ll try not to have any spoilers.
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The world in Thunderhead is expanding. There are new places and regions that come in to place, and the explanation of them and their differing standards of living are well done. This story no longer takes place just around the Scythedom, and seeing the other communities and regions that were only previously mentioned finally be fleshed out was nice.
World: 5
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There are new characters, old characters, surprise characters all throughout the story. It’s told from basically three peoples view for the bulk of the story, but there is peppering of other perspectives as well. There also still are journal entries in between chapters, but with the Thunderhead becoming a part of this with the scythes. The Thunderhead has a surprising amount of personality for an all knowing computer, it is pretty likable and I found myself enjoying the moments with the Thunderhead. The non-scythe characters are also well fleshed out and I found myself caring about them just as much as I did the scythes. There isn’t a lot of character growth from the scythes in this book, they did most of their growing in the first book and this is mainly them maintaining. There is only a little bit. For the non-scythe characters though, they go through a lot of changes and growth throughout the story.
Characters: 5
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The romantic relationships in this book still take a back seat to the story. There’s a little bit of romance, but it’s all G rated or passing mentions of stuff. The friendship is starting to grow for a couple characters, but for the most part it didn’t seem as important.
Relationships: 3
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Emotions in this book were turned up just a hair from the first book. Still no tears or outward emotions, a lot of shock though. I was driven to keep reading though because everything that seemed cleaned up by the end of the first book came crumbling down and then more stuff got piled on top! It’s not exactly suspenseful, but it had me shocked quite a few times. The story leaves off on a bit of a cliff hanger and that might have been my biggest emotion of all – frustration, lol.
Emotions: 4
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The pace of the story is good. It takes place over about a year starting not too long after Scythe left off. There’s a few time skips, but most gaps are filled with other characters’ stories and I never felt like I was missing anything. Some of the more intense moments have a lot of stuff packed into what is really just a few minutes, so the balance is there for the story.
Pace: 4
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Overall I give Thunderhead 4 out of 5 stars. I can’t wait to read the next book to see what happens, ans where the charavters go next! This story keeps surprising me.
Ttyl,
Squared
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