Review: Chameleon by Cidney Swanson

Title: Chameleon

Author: Cidney Swanson
Publication date: September 1st 2011
Age group: Young Adult
Genre: Paranormal
Cover rating: 4/5
Content rating: 5/5
Buy: Amazon

Description:

Sixteen-year-old Samantha Ruiz has a lot on her mind. The crush who kissed her but changed his mind. The BFF who thinks Sam is in an abusive relationship. The geneticist who wanted Sam dead but now wants her ALIVE. And of course, Sam’s still dealing with a tendency to disappear into thin air.  

When Sam learns of her nemesis Helmann’s Nazi-like plan to establish a Thousand-Year Reign, she’s determined to fight him. Along with Will and Mickie, Sam flees to France to meet Sir Walter—their best hope for stopping Helmann’s brave new world. 
But Sam isn’t any safer in France. Someone is following her. Someone invisible. Sam will have to figure out how to hide from an enemy she can’t even see.

My thoughts:
It's not often that I feel compelled to continue on and finish a series. Often, I will love or like the first book but then the second book will bore me to tears and that will be that. But I am so excited about the Ripple series! Chameleon was just as good as, if not better than, the first book. I made the mistake of starting it late at night and had to stay up to finish it because it was so intense! Things would just be calming down and suddenly something else would pop up.

The storyline becomes even more fascinating in this one. There are excerpts scattered throughout this book and they're actually so creepy to read! I usually do not like this style of writing but it worked so well here because the excerpts were so horrifying I could not look away! Swanson has created so many terrifying characters but at the same time they are so incredibly believable. This book certainly gives you a lot to think about and shows you how humans can rationalize horrors to themselves and the long term effects of traumatizing a young child.

Sam, Mickie and Will spend most of this book in Paris and they definitely manage to get themselves into a lot of trouble! I love the interactions between these three characters. None of them take anything too seriously and they're just really fun to read about. Sam and Will developed well throughout this one and we definitely get to see much more of Will's personality shining through! Mickie is as hilarious as ever, even if she's grumpy as hell. If I start talking about Sir Walter, I will never stop. He was so awesome and maybe even my favourite character so far.

As you can see, I'm certainly now a huge fan of Cidney Swanson. Chameleon did not fail to impress and I'll be so excited to get my hands on the third book to see what's in store for these amazing characters!