Daughters of the Moon 2

Ah, Serena. 

I can't remember if she was my favorite first or Jimena. Possibly her because I loved her in the first book, while you barely saw Jimena.

Serena was always presented as the edgy one. She's got piercings in her nose, navel and tongue. This was a much bigger deal back in 2000, I assure you. She has dark, shorter hair that was red in the first book and now is growing out her usual dark shade but still tipped with red. Later in this book, she gets curly extensions, but they're still only shoulder-length. Her green eyes are mentioned as much as her tongue piercing. Heh. 

Vanessa is also described in this book, moreso than in her own. She's your typical blue-eyed blonde. 

Catty has brown eyes and curly brown hair. 

Jimena has black hair and dark eyes.

Antagonist Morgan is blonde. 

Essentially, they mostly look like their book models. 

Anyway, Serena the mind reader spends this entire book dealing with two Followers messing with her own mind. I'm not even pretending like I'm protecting you guys from spoilers. These are really old books. She's got a crush on a new boy at school named Zahi. Well, turns out he's a powerful Atrox Follower and he's trying to turn her to the dark side, so to speak. Working against him is Stanton, the blond bad boy from the first book, who genuinely cares for Serena. Get used to that because they're the bad boy and girl couple that lasts the entirety of this series. 

There are two things that really annoy me about this book. Aside from the typos and such I'm noticing more as someone much older than the target market. (Bolder instead of boulder not once but twice on the same page?) And that they act far older than fifteen.

First, there is absolutely zero backstory ever given about how Stanton and Serena became a couple. He says Zahi has been erasing all her memories of him, but it's never explained what those memories are. From his end, he was interested in her as soon as they mentally faced off in the first book, but we never hear how he got close enough to her to end up with them as a couple. It feels important, but like the author either couldn't figure out how to make it work or just plain didn't want to write it and in both cases, used the mindwipe as an excuse to not have to. It's lazy. I can't remember if it's gone into in future books. It's been so long since I read these last. If she does end up writing it, I'll note it in future reviews.

Second, there's a scene where Zahi and Serena are going to a rave. The setting is a nighttime rave on a California beach. I can't remember if they mentioned the time of year. It's not summer because school is on. One thing about this series is that there's a lot of outfit description. Serena is always well-dressed, though in an unusual and flashy style. Zahi's outfit descriptions were also more well-dressed than your typical teen guy. So what does she wear to this rave? Bright boas, wild makeup, fancy Docs and...sweats. And Zahi is in a sweatshirt and khakis or something. I've never been into rave culture, but I definitely don't think sweats are part of it. 

All the Daughters of the Moon are linked to Selene, but some of them have other goddess connections. Serena's is Hekate and her appearance was fun. 

I don't hate this one, but it's far from my favorite. Jimena was the highlight of the book, so I have a feeling this is where I started liking her more than Serena when I first read these.