All In

spoilers

This was my favourite book from this series. The focus finally shifted away from solely Cassie and her relationship problems and moved onto some more interesting cases, especially as they were allowed to work on active cases rather than cold ones.

The happenings of this book took place mostly in Las Vegas, Sloane’s birthplace. This meant her story was explored on a much deeper level, causing many unexpected twists when reading. The plot did confuse me a little at certain points, but I quickly realised what was going on and got back into it.

Arron was the son of the casino owner, and unknowingly the brother of Sloane. I found this connection enjoyable to read about as it progressed, until it ended. By then, the relationship that they had found with each other had grown stronger, and therefore I will admit I was quite upset when Arron died.

The Fibonacci sequence was used by the killer to determine the when he would kill, and how he would do it. This also confused me, but it didn’t stop me from loving the book as I understood that there was some mathematical thing going on, but not much further. However, the introduction to this sequence led to the discovery of the cult that the group suspected had abducted Cassie’s mum.

In the end, when the criminal was caught, he told all he could before he himself was also murdered. From Beau, the killer, they learnt that he had been kicked out of a cult when he was six years old after not “proving worthy enough” to be a member. The cult killed on a rotation of dates decided by the Fibonacci sequence, and a cycle of seven methods for killing the victims. In the end, Beau died at the hands of a member of the cult via poison whilst being interrogated. Although, this left the team with a lot more information than before, allowing them to progress on the case and hopefully find and eliminate the cult of with Beau was trying to get the attention of.

Afterwards, Cassie meets with the person responsible for his death, and a set of murders seven years before, and from this interaction she learns that her mother was not killed, but was taken to fight another woman for the role of “Pythia” in the cult, who would become the overall lawgiver and judge. In addition to this, she also found out that her mother had given birth to another child whilst hostage who the cult intended on training and moulding to continue the traditions in the future. In my opinion, the way this was revealed was written really well, I kept guessing what would happen next, but getting it wrong repeatedly.

I’m writing this a few weeks after finishing the book, and I know that when I read it, I was fascinated and loved every second of it, although looking back now I have forgotten some aspects of the storyline. However, even with these gaps in my knowledge I still know that this was definitely my favourite in the series. It felt a little less like stereotypical teen/young adult, this one wasn’t overflowing with unnecessary romance and explored some deeper topics. So, overall, I had a thoroughly good time reading this, and if someone was to ask for a quick read recommendation, I would suggest this series, and I think that’s purely so they could get to this book.

★★★★★