Fever by Lauren DeStefano

Fever by Lauren DeStefano

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Publication date: February 12th 2013
My rating: 3 stars

Rhine and Gabriel have escaped the mansion, but they’re still in danger. Outside, they find a world even more disquieting than the one they ran away from. Determined to get to Manhattan and find Rhine’s twin brother, Rowan, the two press forward, amid threats of being captured again…or worse.
The road they are on is long and perilous—and in a world where young women only live to age twenty and men die at age twenty-five, time is precious. In this sequel to Lauren DeStefano’s harrowing Wither, Rhine must decide if freedom is worth the price—now that she has more to lose than ever.

There are ups and downs with Lauren DeStefano. The ups are twisted world building with a slow pace which I usually hate but she makes it work and the down is that I don't know to say about Fever. It's like the whole book was wrapped in a mist and you can't see right. The same thing happened with Wither. 

Fever was mainly about freedom. What would we do to be free? What does it mean to be free? We follow Rhine and Gabriel after they escaped from her Vaughn, Linden and imprisonment only to be chained by so many other things in the real world. Rhine has changed a lot, but she often thinks about how her life would be if she remained in the mansion every time things get unbearable. She is determined to find her brother even though it seems impossible in the world without cellphones or the Internet. I'm actually not sure if there are such things but there weren't any phones so I'm gonna think that technology isn't in use anymore. However there is a lot of drug use, prostitution, kidnapping and even a rape attempt. 

There are some new characters, prostitute Lilac and her malformed daughter Maggie, the cruel madame and a kind lady( forgot her name,sorry) whose daughter was kidnapped and who's trying to make up for the lost time with trowing herself into taking care of abandoned orphans. We get to see Vaughn towards the end and get to witness his terrible experiments on girls. 

If you enjoyed reading Wither, I'm sure you'll like Fever too. It wasn't as good as Wither but it still got me to read at least hundred pages on a really busy day when I would rather sleep than read. 

Once upon a time there were two parents, two children, and a brick house with lilies in the yard. The parents died, the lilies wilted. One child disappeared. Then the other.

I was born on January 30, a minute and a half before my brother. I wish I could remember it. I wish I had a memory of that first violent shove, the shock of cold air, the sting of oxygen into new lungs. Everyone should remember being born. It doesn’t seem fair that we only remember dying.

Love unrequited is violent. He loves you so much that he's turned it into hate.