Behemoth
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Release: October 5th 2010
Genre: Steampunk, YA
#2 in the Leviathan trilogy
Plot:
The behemoth is the fiercest creature in the British navy. It can swallow enemy battleships with one bite. The Darwinists will need it, now that they are at war with the Clanker powers.
Deryn is a girl posing as a boy in the British Air Service, and Alek is the heir to an empire posing as a commoner. Finally together aboard the airship Leviathan, they hope to bring the war to a halt. But when disaster strikes the Leviathan's peacekeeping mission, they find themselves alone and hunted in enemy territory.
Alek and Deryn will need great skill, new allies, and brave hearts to face what's ahead.
Review:
A lot of people said they had been disappointed with the sequels to Leviathan. Alas, it was the opposite for me: Whereas Leviathan was only meh, this one was actually really good.
Let me start off with one thing that has been on my mind over the course of the whole book — Westerfeld's, or his editor's, or whoever did the German conversations, German sucks. There were quite a few passages that were right, but most of the German that has been used was wrong. Grammatically wrong. A shame, really.
Anyways, I liked the plot of it. Things happened. The book was fast-paced but didn't feel slow anyways, like its predecessor did, and it wasn't always the same happening. The general gist was the same, escaping from danger, but that's pretty much what they always do in books like these. No surprise there.
Now, Alek is at times even more idiotic than in the first novel, and at times a littler wiser. Sometimes I hated him for his stupidity and sometimes I loved him for his charms and his attitude. I still can't really make up my mind about him, I have a love/hate relationship with him. I absolutely loved his relationship with Count Volger though, at the end especially, their dynamic is just really well brought across. Then, we have Dr. Barlow, which we didn't see that much of in this novel (same as with Volger), but she was still an extremely good character. Deryn was better than in the first novel and I like her more now, as well as the new female we are introduced to, Lilit. She seemed a little spoiled and arrogant at first, which didn't make her very likeable, but she warms up later and she really wasn't too bad. But, well, the best character in this novel was definitely Bovril, Alek's new pet beastie. I would like to have one of those, please.
Ah, what else can I say? I really liked this book and I'm excited to see where Goliath is going to take me. I will be reading right now!
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