Onyx (Lux #2)

What I loved:
Wow. Favorite new Para­nor­mal Romance series, thy name is Lux. I've said before that from the moment I first started see­ing the Lux books float­ing around, I avoided them. But the thing that finally con­vinced me to check it out was Julie's review over at All Things Urban Fan­tasy, where she said, "As much as I enjoyed OBSIDIAN, ONYX was even bet­ter." Con­fes­sion time: Some­times I start a book series just to get to a cer­tain book in that series. The best exam­ple would have to be Julie Kagawa's The Iron Queen from The Iron Fey series or even Richelle Mead's Shadow Kiss from Vam­pire Acad­emy. Even though I do believe that each book in a series should be able to stand on its own merit, I will often tell peo­ple to read those series just to get to that spe­cial book. And I know that there is more to come from the Lux series, but until then I'll be say­ing to read this series to read Onyx. Because where Obsid­ian was fun, addic­tive and sexy, Onyx does it so much bet­ter.

Armen­trout wasn't fool­ing around with Onyx. From the very begin­ning it seemed she had a plan to really up the ante with book two and I'm happy to say it didn't dis­ap­point. We have a notice­able amount of deeper char­ac­ter growth for both Dae­mon and Katy, all-around bet­ter plot, and of course, more ban­ter & steamy scenes. So obvi­ously that makes this a more dif­fi­cult review to write with­out spoilers.

Onyx picks up shortly after Obsid­ian and we have Katy, still sar­cas­tic as ever, and Dae­mon, deter­mined to prove to Katy his feel­ings are true and not just the result of their new­found alien con­nec­tion. In fact, the biggest change in Onyx is Dae­mon and his atti­tude for Katy. Gone is the "douche canoe" from the pre­vi­ous novel and let's just say I can totally see when the dude has a Face­book page called Dae­mon Inva­sion. But Katy pushes Dae­mon away at every chance she gets. And while this did get a bit frus­trat­ing as a reader, I can under­stand her reluc­tance to him con­sid­er­ing his past actions, no mat­ter what his inten­tions were. Unfor­tu­nately, her stub­born­ness ulti­mately ends with dev­as­tat­ing con­se­quences that I hon­estly never saw com­ing. I'm not going to give it away, but I'll say I shed a few tears.

What Left Me Wanting More:
One thing I was sad about was Dee's char­ac­ter being slightly put on the back burner in this novel. I missed the rela­tion­ship between her and Katy. Instead, Katy's time in Onyx is almost com­pletely monop­o­lized by a new char­ac­ter, Blake, or as Dae­mon would call him: Bozo, due to his jeal­ously that he man­ages to mar­gin­ally hide from Katy. I wish I could tell you more about Blake, but that would give away way too much of the plot. How­ever, I did think there was a love tri­an­gle brew­ing... and I'm happy that I was wrong. But the best part of this new char­ac­ter? Fun, fun, fun banter!

Quote: "Jesus." Blake rubbed his throat. "You have anger man­age­ment prob­lem. It's like a dis­ease."
"There's a cure and it's called kick­ing your ass."

The plot is so much deeper, sus­pense­ful and com­plex too. I thought I had an idea where things were going at the end of Obsid­ian, but I was so wrong. There were so many twists in this book and not a shred of a Twi­light sim­i­lar­ity, I might add. What I once thought was sim­ply black and white (the DOD, Daw­son and Bethany's dis­ap­pear­ance, Katy and Daemon's con­nec­tion) was turned upside down. Just... wow.

And the steamy scenes between Katy and Dae­mon? I knew based on a guest post at Xpresso Reads that Armen­trout didn't plan on shy­ing away from sex in a YA novel, because really, it's a part of life and coming of age. But, oh, my...

Quote: "Time stopped for us. The world and every­thing I'd been part of only existed out­side the closed bed­room door, but in here, it was only us. And for the first time, there was noth­ing between us. We were open, vul­ner­a­ble to each other. Pieces of our cloth­ing dis­ap­peared. His shirt. Mine. A but­ton came undone on his jeans... and on mine, too."

Final Verdict: I'm not sure what it is about the Lux series or Armentrout's writ­ing that has me beg­ging for more, but I know I am now des­per­ately wait­ing for Opal. And if the cliffhanger at the end of Onyx is an indi­ca­tion of any­thing, it's that the Lux series is like a fine bot­tle of wine, get­ting bet­ter and bet­ter with age.

This is one sequel I knew I had to read! I loved the first book in the Lux series, OBSIDIAN. I wasn't able to grab a galley(yes, even some of us don't get every upcoming book we want) but that didn't stop me from preordering ONYX.

First off ONYX had everything I loved about the first book and even more! There's a beat to the dialogue and pacing between Katy and Daemon. I felt as if I was right there with them. Daemon is beyond adorable and when Blake, a new guy shows up and shows Katy interest? I'm like, serious girl, what is your problem?

Katy learns when Daemon healed her that he also changed her in ways that she's not sure she likes. This change goes even deeper than glowing whenever she's in a Lux's presence. Blake plays a huge part on the choice Katy has to make when she finds out the truth of what has happened to her. Let's just say Daemon isn't too happy about this.

Jennifer Armentrout gives us characters we love and will follow anywhere. The romance builds to a sizzling new hot level. Yes, I confess, I swooned in more than a few places! Katy stumbles on something behind the mystery surrounding Daemon's missing brother Dawson. We also find out there's more to the dreaded DOD. More mysteries surface that include a love interest for Katy's mother.

Sizzling hot romance with a Roswell the TV show feel, this sequel is sure to excite Jennifer Armentrout fans. There's even an extra bonus tale at the end of this story that gives Daemon's POV.

The only problem I had with this book is it ended too soon! I WANT MORE!!!!

"Everything is about to change."

I didn't think it was possible to love Daemon Black any more but I was wrong. *SWOON*

I was beyond excited when I received this ARC and I couldn't wait to see what was in store for Katy and everyone's favorite glow-worm, Daemon Black.

Just like any other JLA book, I read this in one sitting because I couldn't put it down! I was laughing, crying and clutching my chest by the time I was done. Seriously, CLUTCHING MY CHEST at the end! *cries*

Onyx picks up where Obsidian left off with the DOD sniffing around and the tension between Katy and Daemon is just as hot and feisty as ever. *fans face* He's dead set on proving to her that his feelings are legit while she's convinced he's only doing it as a result of their weird connection. He can't really have feelings for her can he? This IS Daemon we're talking about... (If Katy isn't into Daemon's affections, I'll make like Katniss, and step up, "I VOLUNTEER! I VOLUNTEER!!")

The saucy Luxen is just as snarky as ever and even funnier that he was in Obsidian. We get to see a lighter side of him (no pun intended) and jealous Daemon is laugh-out-loud, snort-liquid-through-your-nose hilarious! One of my FAVORITE scenes is when Daemon "helps" Katy with her blog. (My stomach hurt from laughing so hard it counted as my ab workout for the day.) And the scene at the Thai restaurant was a true "Daemon Invasion". *giggles*

So much has changed for Katy in a short amount of time and she's struggling to make sense of it all and just "deal", really. Add to that, her feelings for Daemon which run hot and cold, her Mom's love life, and the new guy at school whose not only hotsauce but showing serious interest in her and you can't blame a girl for wanting a slice of normal pie. (Especially if it's served up surfer dude a la mode. *wink*)

The problem is that everyone seems to be hiding something and the new guy, Blake is no exception. When Daemon voices his "concerns" about Blake, Katy will have to choose between trusting herself or trusting Daemon and her choice could end up costing more than just her own broken heart. That would be the least of Katy's concerns if who she saw really is still alive and Daemon finds out because it'll mean the DOD will be on them faster than a fly on a cow pie. She knows he'll stop at nothing until he gets the truth but what will the truth cost them?

In this action packed and often *face fanning* sequel, Katy and Daemon will discover that the DOD may not be their biggest threat after all. Secrets are revealed, love declared, and friendship put to the ultimate test, forcing them to make choices that could have devastating results for them as well as those they love. The only thing they know for sure is that everything is about to change...CLUTCHES.CHEST!