“Sometimes I wondered if hanging out with Charlotte Holmes had made me into a monster.
At times like this, I knew it for sure.”
In the second brilliant, action-packed book in the Charlotte Holmes trilogy, Jamie and Charlotte are in a chase across Europe to untangle a web of shocking truths about the Holmes and Moriarty families.
Jamie Watson and Charlotte Holmes are looking for a winter break reprieve in Sussex after a fall semester that almost got them killed. But nothing about their time off is proving simple, including Holmes and Watson’s growing feelings for each other. When Charlotte’s beloved uncle Leander goes missing from the Holmes estate—after being oddly private about his latest assignment in a German art forgery ring—the game is afoot once again, and Charlotte throws herself into a search for answers.
So begins a dangerous race through the gritty underground scene in Berlin and glittering art houses in Prague, where Holmes and Watson discover that this complicated case might change everything they know about their families, themselves, and each other.
Book Links: Amazon | B&N | BD | Goodreads | Publisher
Personal Thoughts:
Set during the school break of the lead characters, Charlotte Holmes and Jamie Watson, The Last of August pick up where the first book, A Study in Charlotte left off. Now, Charlotte and Jamie are in London trying to figure out how and why Charlotte’s Uncle Leander gone missing. Charlotte and Jamie travel around Europe solving mysteries with August Moriarty – Charlotte’s former tutor and first crush who are now working under Charlotte’s brother, Milo Holmes.
This second installment focus more on Charlotte and Jamie’s relationship. Something I should have expected if I have read the book’s tag-line “Watson and Holmes: A match made in disaster.” But then, the ever oblivious me, (who usually read books without reading anything about it first not even the blurb of the back cover) just don’t expect too much “relationship issues”. Sure, I like the constant tension between Charlotte and Jamie from A Study in Charlotte, but in this installment not so much. I think, it took too much space and time which I wish was alloted in solving mysteries and crimes instead.
The mystery was for the most part interesting albeit not thrilling as I want it to be. Leander disappearance concerned me at first but with all the other things that is happening I honestly lost my interest in finding out what really happened to Charlotte’s missing Uncle. So when the answer was revealed near the end I feel like I don’t care anymore what happened to the guy.
The ending is really unexpected and I’m not sure how to feel about it. Thinking more, it feels like, it’s totally unnecessary but then maybe the author is starting to lay out something for the third installment. I just hope that something is big and will justify that awful ending for one character that I grown to like. Or maybe, that’s not really what happened. After-all, we are in a Holmes’ novel. Not everything that’s been told is necessary real.
Overall, The Last of August is intriguing and interesting just like the first installment. If only this wasn’t too much focus on the characters relationship instead of the mystery I probably enjoyed this one more.
_
* This review is based on an advance readers copy I received courtesy of the publisher, Katherine Tegen an imprint of HarperCollins International in exchange of honest opinion.
blackplume 