Review - Seeker by Jerome Gilden

Title:  Seeker
Series: Timeline #2
Author: Jerome Gilden

Release Date: January 26, 2014

Pages: 166

Goodreads Rating: 4.77/5 Stars

My Rating: 3/5 Stars

My Content Rating: YA (Some violence)

Summary from Goodreads:  Who am I really? It’s a question that has been haunting me since I first discovered I was a Tracer, a Royal. A secret race of humans that are in the midst of a civil war, a war that I’m now involved in too. 

The Morters killed my adopted parents without hesitation. They came after me too and my friends. But I survived, as well as I could anyway. 

An entire Royal family that preceded generations of Tracers, all wiped out in a matter of hours. How? Why? 

All these questions are pushing me deeper into the depths of the dead. Almost all anyway. But the secrets they left behind, the secrets of my people, those are what keep me up at night and alert everywhere else. 

I’ve discovered my abilities. Fought great evil and won. Or so I thought. There’s something coming. Something dark and powerful. I know it’s coming for me but I don’t know if I’ll survive it this time round. 

My name is Jerry Daniels. I’m 21 years old. 

Yesterday, I saved my friends. 

Today, I learn more about my people. 

Tomorrow, I prepare for war.

***NOTE: This review may contain spoilers for the first book in the series.  Click on the link to read my review of Tracers.***

I was honestly a bit surprised when the author asked me the review this book.  After all, I only gave the first book in the series one star because I felt like the quality of the writing just wasn't there.  I did think that Gilden had a good idea, though.  So, when he asked me to review this second book, I just couldn't turn him down - after all, he's obviously tenacious!

I will say that I might have enjoyed this book more if I had read the first book in the series more recently.  I couldn't remember all of the details of what happened in the first book, and the reminders in this book weren't enough to quite make up for my lack of memory.

Anyway, let me get to my actual review -

What I enjoyed:

• Improved writing.  As I mentioned, my biggest complaint about the first book was the writing style.  I'm happy to report that Gilden has definitely improved in this second book.  There are still some editing issues - the biggest one being that I noticed that the book flipped between tenses sometimes.  Still, I was happy to see some real improvement in the writing!
• Unique concept.  In this book, Tracers are able to change people's timelines (but they aren't able to save someone who has died).  A group of Tracers called the Royals also have other special powers.  But there are other people called the Morters who are trying to wipe out the Royals.  To make things even more complicated, grim reapers are also after Jerry (the main character).  It made for an interesting, action-packed story.
• Twists and turns.  I can't talk about this extensively because I don't want to spoil anything, but there were some interesting twists to the story that kept me guessing!

The negatives:

• Sometimes hard to follow.  Again, this may have partially been because it had been so long since I read the first book, but I sometimes found the story a little bit confusing.  I especially found the parts that had to do with the grim reapers hard to follow - I just wasn't 100% clear on who they really were and what their true goals were.  In the end, it was explained, but I still couldn't fully explain it to someone if I needed to.

So, overall, I'd say that this second book in the series was a definite improvement.  I think if Gilden did a bit of editing on his first book (and maybe just a bit more on this book), he'd have a really enjoyable series! I give this second book 3/5 stars.

***Disclosure: This book was provided to me by the author in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given. All opinions are my own***