What is this about?
Lily is asked to find a missing girl, one that was taken right in front of Stan when he took her back home. It’s nothing new for Lily, but given the events of the The Ninja’s Daughter, only just recently happened in this book, Lily is rattled. Aleisha, Stan’s wife and co-owner of Aleisha’s refuge says it’s PTSD. While she is battling Aleisha’s concern on one front, on another things are slightly changing at home – her demanding grandparents have come to visit, for the mother’s 50th birthday, but it soon becomes clear that things are changing in her grandfather’s company, and that her mother’s expectation of some day running the company might actually not happen. Family politics is one thing, and funnily enough, Daniel, the guy she surprisingly finds herself liking, surrounded by the chaos of her family, is the calm in the centre of her storm.
What else is this about?
Readers are introduced to the complexities of Lily’s family, of her mother marrying a Norweigan and staying in America, and as such never quite being enough for her grandparents. However, there’s something else brewing, and while we don’t know what exactly, this book ends with the promise of things changing in her family.
Blurb
Lily Wong–a Chinese-Norwegian modern-day ninja–has more trouble than she was bargaining for when controlling grandparents arrive in Los Angeles from Hong Kong at the same time she goes undercover in the dangerous world of sex trafficking in this second book in the series. As she hunts for a missing high school girl, a kidnapped prostitute, and a sociopathic pimp, the surviving members of a murderous street gang hunt for her. Life would be easier if Lily knew who to trust. But when victims are villains, villains are victims, and even family is plotting against her, easy is not an option. All Lily can do is follow the trail wherever it leads: through a high school campus polarized by racial tension or the secret back rooms of a barber/tattoo/brothel or the soul-crushing stretch of Long Beach Boulevard known as The Blade. She relies on her ninja skills to deceive and infiltrate, rescue and kill–whatever is necessary to free the girls from their literal and figurative slavery. If only those same skills could keep Lily’s conniving grandparents from hijacking her future.
The Ninja’s Blade opens a few weeks after The Ninja Daughter and the events there.
Lily is out of balance, she knows it but she won’t acknowledge what Aleisha and Stan are urging her to see – that she has PTSD. Instead, she focuses on her work, on helping the women in Aleisha’s Refuge. But, when Emma disappears from in front of Stan, who for his trouble gets a gun stuck in his face, Lily can’t ignore their request for help to find Emma. And that takes her into a sex trafficking ring…
Right when her grandparents come to visit
I had high hopes of something fun, lighter for Lily when I read her grandparents were coming to visit, but that was not what I got. Instead, her grandparents are fiercely traditional, and critical of her mother and her choices (and by that I mean her husband and Lily’s father who is Norweigan). I suspect the tension between her mother and her grandparents might’ve spilled into the relationship between Lily and her mother, who expects her to go to college and do everything she should be doing. Only Lily decidedly isn’t.
While the family dynamic wasn’t what I expected, it still proved interesting in the way things began to shift – Lily’s mother is running her family’s business in LA, while the company is based in Hong Kong, and there are enough hints that something has changed for grandparents to do with the company, something that is making Lily’s mother very worried. However, as much as I liked how this changed things between Lily and her mother, I wanted more. Lily is very separate to the goings on in her family and only peripherally interested in it as an observer if nothing else. I want to see more of this affects her.
Another interesting part of this, is Daniel – the very normal guy her mother wants her to date, and her grandparents might be possibly marrying her off to in their heads. Thing is, to her surprise, she finds she likes Daniel, and that is something I did not see coming because he doesn’t fit in her life at all. But, I hope that means we’ll see her try to fit him in her life.
The case
Lily infiltrates a sex trafficking ring, playing the part of a prostitute looking for a pimp. It’s dangerous, it’s bloody but she’s driven to find Emma. Along the way, she finds other girls caught up in the same ring, and begins a working relationship with a cop, which should prove interesting if it continues to be part of her story.
Lily is definitely rattled in this boo, haunted by the memories of her actions in the first book, and it makes her fallible, interesting and filled with shades of grey too.
The pacing is ridiculously good in this book, and the action even more ridiculously good – I found myself at the end of the book and wondered how on earth I got there!
This section on the plot is light on detail because the gloriousness of Lily in action, manipulating the people around her to get to Emma needs to be experienced – this is a fast-paced addition to this series, that manages to balance the case and Lily’s own characterisation and changes as Eldridge continues to open Lily up, letting readers know parts of her they wouldn’t expect.
I did want more of her interactions with her family, or have her more included in it, but I’m willing to see where that goes in the next book – and really, it’s a minor something I wanted in an otherwise excellent book.
I really want to give this series a try. Lily sounds like such a great character!
She is — and the series is really just going from strength to strength.
I liked the first book, and I’m looking forward to this one!
this one managed to surprise me, and then convert me into looking forward to where things are going to go for Lily and her family, espeically. The family dynamics are so interesting.
Poor Lilly just seems destined for darkness. Makes for a great read at least!
Up until the last chapter of this, I would agree with you, Ethan, but now I’m beginning to wonder if Lily is finally beginning to see there’s life after her sister’s murder — in an unexpected way. Mind you, with my track record I could be WAYYYYYYYYYYYY off base!
I love the sound of Lily’s character, she sounds as though she’s damned either way. I was hoping that the introduction of her parents would have provided a few lighthearted moments and of their family growing together and supporting Lily but it must have just added more pressure on the poor girl. It sounds like a great read regardless, wonderful review Verushka, so glad you enjoyed it!
Lily is incredibly fascinating — int he first book, I thought she would be only comfortable in the darkness, and didn’t see a way out of there for herself. Now, after this one, I’m beginning to wonder if Lily is allowing herself to see a way out of forever seeking revenge for her sister’s death. I really did want something lighthearted to counter-balance the darkness i expected in Lily’s story after the first boo,k, but Eldridge did the unexpected with this book, and Lily is heading down a different ppath it seems. Curious to see how this goes in the next one.
This sounds like such an interesting read, especially the dynamic between Lily and her family. Definitely sounds like more of that would have made for an even more excellent read.
It really is — I feel like the family dynamic is a set up for the next book, and the inclusion of Daniel is an added twist I didn’t expect. I really did expect Lily to be in the darkness of the first book for a bit longer, and she definitely is in this one, but also I am beginning to wonder if she’s actually beginning to see a way out for herself.