Scott Bergström’s book series is celebrated as a rejuvenator of the young adult genre, although it’s highly debatable whether it can even be called young adult at all; after all, the only connection is the protagonist’s age, and even that’s mostly true only in the first book, where Gwendolyn, who certainly isn’t your typical teenager, was a 17-year-old youngster. In ” The Greed,” she’s now trampling through her 19th grim year. (And their adversaries. She tramples them too.)
The not-so-human-friendly world of espionage isn’t a common theme in YA literature either (the Alex Rider books come to mind suddenly, although they’re aimed at a much younger audience). So, this series can be enjoyed by mature teenagers and up, as it’s fundamentally entertaining.
Scott Bergström is no longer as modest when it comes to sex as he was in the first part: little Gwendolyn has become somewhat more daring; although it’s true that the momentum slows down during the romantic parts, the author fails to convincingly convey deeper emotions. Here, you really sense a bit of a taste for young adult literature, although fortunately it’s only for a few chapters.
As cliché as “The Greed” is in matters of romance, it is just as unpredictably engaging as a thriller. In the first book, Gwendolyn discovered the cruelty within herself needed to stay alive, and now she’s presenting the bill for all the suffering. After the well-developed opening chapters, she embarks on diverse adventures: hiding, fleeing, investigating her own parents’ past, a bit of reluctantly accepted hitman work, and then stiffly opposed “hospital treatment”; however, her adventures occasionally trespass into the realm of unseriousness for brief moments.
Fortunately, although Gwendolyn is at least as sharp as, say, Jane Hawk (see Dean Koontz’s “The Whispering Room“), it turns out she’s not (always) invincible. And fortunately—better late than never—Bergström also realizes that what doesn’t work (and here we mean romantic troubles) doesn’t need to be forced—even if it means traveling all the way to Budapest.
In similar novels, the good side is usually represented by Americans, but here, the faceless CIA is the antagonist—no super-secret clique or a few treacherous scoundrels; Gwendolyn and her father anger the entire company, indeed the entire glorious American nation. A more believable and tangible main antagonist wouldn’t have hurt the story.
The ending of „The Greed”, however, is too, um, bombastic, and the clumsy melodramatic final scene is just another reminder of the young adult toolkit. But at least you can guess what the title of the next book will likely be. Envy? Pride? Lust? Ummm, no, more like something related to irreconcilable vengeance.
7.7/10
The Greed (The Cruelty #2) by Scott Bergstrom
416 pages, Hardcover
Published in 2018 by Feiwel & Friends