Such Wicked Intent (The Apprenticeship of Victor Frankenstein #2) by Kenneth Oppel

When does obsession become madness? Tragedy has forced sixteen-year-old Victor Frankenstein to swear off alchemy forever. He burns the Dark Library. He vows he will never dabble in the dark sciences again, just as he vows he will no longer covet Elizabeth, his brother's betrothed. If only these things were not so tempting. 

When he and Elizabeth discover a portal into the spirit world, they cannot resist. Together with Victor's twin, Konrad, and their friend Henry, the four venture into a place of infinite possibilities where power and passion reign. But as they search for the knowledge to raise the dead, they unknowingly unlock a darkness from which they may never return.

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If I struggled to get through the first book in this series, This Dark Endeavor, it is nothing compared to the way I struggled to finish Such Wicked Intent. Again, I found myself struggling to connect with the characters, especially Victor, the main character. I just found the characters and their development to be so inconsistent. One moment I was able to connect with them and understood their motivations and what made them tick, and the next moment they were doing or saying something that made me either confused or instantly dislike them. This constant flipping back and forth made it difficult for me to fully understand them. 

While I realize this book is a work of fiction, the plot line of this story was so far fetched and bizarre that I had a hard time buying it. For me, fiction works best when it has some (even the smallest bit) basis in reality. I think the first book in the series had that, but this one did not and because of it, I had a hard time buying into the story.

Don't get me wrong, the story wasn't all bad. There was plenty of adventure and mystery, and some parts of the narrative were really good. But as a whole, this book just didn't come together for me in the end.