Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman

SYNOPSIS

Rowan has gone rogue, and has taken it upon himself to put the Scythedom through a trial by fire. Literally. In the year since Winter Conclave, he has gone off-grid, and has been striking out against corrupt scythes—not only in MidMerica, but across the entire continent. He is a dark folk hero now—“Scythe Lucifer”—a vigilante taking down corrupt scythes in flames.

Citra, now a junior scythe under Scythe Curie, sees the corruption and wants to help change it from the inside out, but is thwarted at every turn, and threatened by the “new order” scythes. 

Realizing she cannot do this alone—or even with the help of Scythe Curie and Faraday, she does the unthinkable, and risks being “deadish” so she can communicate with the Thunderhead—the only being on earth wise enough to solve the dire problems of a perfect world. But will it help solve those problems, or simply watch as perfection goes into decline?

Synopsis from Goodreads

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PERSONAL REVIEW

I liked Scythe, but Thunderhead really brings us to a new level of chaos. We left off with Citra being named Scythe Anastasia, Rowen going on the run, and many, many questions about what was going to happen next. Thunderhead begins months later and we jump straight into the action. Shusterman doesn’t waste any time in this book (which I appreciated) and gives us a lot of unexpected twists and surprises along the way.

Excellent Twists
Without giving any spoilers, I should warn that there are a lot of unexpected surprises in store for readers! One of the biggest is the addition of a new character, Greyson, whose storyline continues to intersect with other characters, but we don’t really know what role he plays until the very end of the novel. He’s definitely the character I had the most sympathy for in this book and I’m really interested to see where Shusterman brings his storyline to in the next book. Rowan’s story takes just as many twists and turns as Greyson’s and I was impressed with where his storylines goes; we are reintroduced to some characters from the first book (a certain party boy makes a reappearance) and it’s great to see how the new Rowan has to deal with old friends. Hold your breathe for the last few chapters: they weren’t completely unexpected and will definitely shake up the entire world.

Citra and Rowen Time!
We know that Rowen and Citra fell in love in Scythe, but I didn’t really feel like I was witness to it happening. They spent more time apart then together and I was really hoping that that would change in Thunderhead. And it did! With each of them in new roles, we finally get the chance to spend more time with them together, as well as seeing them think about each other. Just like in Scythe, Rowan is once again ready to die as long as it means he gets to see Citra again before it happens, but this time I actually bought his feelings (and hers). Unlike other trilogies where the couple is often challenged by a third character, resulting in a love triangle (ugh!), Thunderhead stays away from that cliche and actually gives us more character development instead. I liked their relationship a lot more in this book and it ended on a MASSIVE cliffhanger for them — it will be really interesting to see what their world, and their relationship, looks like in the next novel.

Warning: Do Not Piss Off the Thunderhead
Remember how kind and benevolent Thunderhead was in Scythe? Well we definitely find out what happens when Thunderhead feels betrayed — and it is not good for the rest of world. Again, no big spoilers here, but I did want to say that I was not expecting the response that Thunderhead had at the end of this book. It still hasn’t gone all Terminator on humanity and trying to take over the world, but it definitely rocks all of society with a pretty dramatic tantrum that will have major repercussions in the next book. I won’t go to much more into that, but this was a development I wasn’t really expecting and it will be really interesting to find out what the end game is with this storyline...

Overall, I thought that Thunderhead was actually a stronger book then Scythe and definitely doesn’t fall into the dreaded “middle book of a series fail” that can often happen; if anything, we actually got more characters and plot development here then we did in the first book. I’m really interested to see what happens in the next book (I’m predicting some kind on time jump. Thoughts?) and can’t believe we have to wait a year for it!

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FINAL RATING: 4/5