This is the second book in a two book series and while there will be no spoilers for this one there might be some comments that will spoil the first book. If you want to check out my review for the first one, click here.

All These Warriors by Amy Tintera

Publication Date: July13, 2021

Summary from NetGalley:

In this highly anticipated conclusion to New York Times best-selling author Amy Tintera’s All These Monsters duology, Clara and Team Seven’s quest to expose the truth behind the scrab menace has them facing their biggest threat yet: their own demons. Perfect for fans of Warcross and Renegades.

When the world was crumbling, seventeen-year-old Clara fought back. She escaped her abusive home and joined Team Seven, a monster fighting squad of runaways and misfits formed to combat the scrabs terrorizing the planet. And after nearly dying in Paris, Clara and Team Seven discovered the sinister truth behind the scrab invasion. Scrabs aren’t just mindless monsters set on destruction. They’re being trained and weaponized by MDG, a private security firm hired by the government.

Now Clara and the rest of Team Seven have made it their mission to expose MDG. But no one said fighting for the truth would be easy. And as Clara and Team Seven find themselves at the center of a global conspiracy, they must face their biggest threat yet: their own demons.

ARC provided by HMH Books for Young Readers via NetGalley for an honest review.

Confession:

This second book in the duology is just as full of action and fighting monsters as the first one. This one however does look a bit more closely at the characters and at domestic abuse than the first one.

Clara is still our only narrator, but that is ok. She is reliable and a fun character to hang with. She still has trouble expressing her feelings and this often leaves her feeling frustrated. But on the plus side, this frustration helps her to start standing up for herself and making her feelings known to the others around her. Clara goes through a lot of growth in this one, and she still has far to go at the end.

All of team seven that survived book one are back. I loved them all, but would have liked to see a few of them a bit more. Maddie gets a bigger role and although her and Clara do become better friends, Maddie has to learn to listen to others and not be quite so controlling of everything, which she does by the end. I ended up liking Maddie much more in this book than the first one.

The slow burn romance between Clara and Edan continues and heats up in this book. I really like Edan and wanted things to work out between them from the start. Edan was always a much better choice. The romance was sweetly done.

Julian’s character was so intense in this book, and if I could have one wish, it would be to see some of this story from his point of view. Many of his choices in this book were just so irrational that it would have been interesting to see the thoughts behind them. He also stalks and harasses Clara which was handled well. The whole domestic abuse plot line between Clara and Julian was well done in both books.

The scrabs continue to be terrifying and the fight scenes with them gory and scary at times. We do find out a little bit more about where they came from and my one negative comment would be that this wasn’t explored enough in the plot. It was just sort of stated and then everyone moved on. The ending, while good and what I wanted, still sounded a bit too good. It also wrapped up pretty quickly in the last fifty pages. Evil was conquered and everyone lived happily ever after if you know what I mean.

Overall though this was a very satisfying ending to this series. It could have been a little bit more meaty, but I liked how everything was wrapped up in the end. This is a fast paced science fiction story that is all the more horrifying because it is set in a present day reality with present day issues explored.