The Nine Lives of Chloe King review

The Nine Lives of Chloe King by Liz Braswell
2.5 out of 5

The Nine Lives of Chloe King is actually a 3-part series- now available in a bind-up. I'm going to review each part individually as I read it to make it easier to keep the story straight, then give it an overall review when I'm done.

The Fallen
2 out of 5

Chloe King falls to her death the day before her 16th birthday, only to wake up a few minutes later. From there, her life turns upside down. Her best friends, Amy and Paul, start dating which makes her the third wheel in their relationship. She's overcome with desire for several guys that she previously would not have the nerve to talk to. She has cat-like abilities and claws that she never had before. And people are trying to kill her. There are two guys in her life, Alyec and Brian, but she doesn't know who to trust.

Not a lot happens in this book. It's not until the very end that she finds out who is her friend and who is her enemy. Mostly she whines the whole time. Chloe is a pretty awful character, as are her friends and mother. So far I'm not impressed with this book but the action is picking up so I'll read on to see where it goes.

Some spoilers are possible for the next two parts

The Stolen
2.5 out of 5

Now that Chloe knows she's Mai, part of an ancient race of cat people, and being hunted by The Order of the Tenth Blade, an equally ancient group bent on destroying the Mai, she's been taken to safety by the pride leader, Sergei. She learns a lot of things about the Mai, like she can not kiss a human or they die. Sergei becomes like a father to her, but she starts to feel trapped and misses her friends. She sneaks out and her friends tell her that her mom is missing. She sets up a meeting to get her mother back that ends up as a showdown between herself, the Mai and the Order. She dies for a second time to save her mother and ends up being recognized as The Chosen One and true leader of the pride. The reader also finds out that Sergei isn't too happy about it in the epilogue.

This book was not as bad as the first one. Chloe isn't as insufferable. Neither are her friends and mother. We also got some other POVs and it was nice to get out of Chloe's. Being the longest book in the bind-up, not a lot happened during most of the book, though. I did like the addition of Kim. She ended up as my favorite character in this book.

The Chosen
3 out of 5

Chloe is back with her mom, trying to live a normal life and deal with the fact that she's The Chosen One. Her status in the pride allows her to bring Brian, the son of the Order's leader, to the Mai clinic when she finds him almost dead. Convinced he is going to die, Brian kisses Chloe. But he doesn't die and it seems that the curse that prevented this ended when Chloe died saving her mother. She also is attacked by Sergei and the Order assassin that he'd been working with the kill her, along with her birth mother and sister. In the end, Chloe wants a truce and uses the modern police to get it by reporting both Sergei's illegal activities and the assassin murdering him. With the loss of yet another life, Chloe achieves this. Now she can be with Brian, the human she can now kiss.

This was by far the best book of the series, but it feels that there was meant to be more. A possible biological brother was mentioned but never explored. There was a possibility that Chloe's adopted dad knew that she was Mai, but it was also not pursued. Before Sergei tried to kill her, he mentioned trying to find her adopted father, but nothing came of it. The curse was also lifted as almost an afterthought. Of course I knew it was going to happen, but it was like "Oh he didn't die? It must have happened weeks ago when you saved your mom."

The characters are all less annoying in this book. Kim did turn out to be my favorite.

Overall
The story and characters got better as it went along, but it was lucky they were together in a bind-up. If I had read that first book as a single volume, I would never have finished. Stuff felt unfinished at the end, though, and I hate when possible plots are introduced then dropped. It was incredibly evident in the last book of the series. I'd not really recommend this book if you have anything else to read. I only read it so I could watch the show, and I hope that the show isn't as bad.