Book Review: Cascade by Lisa T. Bergren

WARNING: This Review might contain Spoilers about Book 1: Waterfall.

At First Sight: Once again, Gabbi and Lia Bentarrini find themselves in 14th Century Italy, but this time they have brought their mother in tow.

After helping Siena on their perpetual war agains Florence and narrowly escaping an assassination attempt, Gabbi is back and even though she's not sure yet of what she wants to do next, she knows she wants to do it by Marcello's side. But, though Marecello's love is true, things have changed at Castello Forelli.

What for the girls felt like 10 minutes, it was close to 3 months at the Castello. Three months that saw Marcello's older brother Fortino restored to health and engaged to Marcello's erstwhile fiance Lady Romana Rossi. 

And while the city of Siena is happy to have it's heroines back, not everyone is thrilled at the girls's return, and soon they are thrown into even more danger than ever before unsure who is ally and who is a foe. 

Second Glance: Cascade picks up right after the end of Waterfall and it wastes no time getting into the thick of things, and the whole situation gets kicked up a notch with political intrigue and betrayals and the background the rivalry between these two cities.  

I really liked to see how the characters grew and I got to know them a bit more, how Lia starts to fall for their new surroundings and Lucca even though she was very reluctant about both at the beginning, also loved how their mother took everything in, and that she believes in her daughters, even if she does get distracted by the archeologist inside of her. 

The guys, Lucca and Marcello are everything a girl could want, in a very old fashioned way, and it was fun to see them struggle to understand Gabbi and Lia, and their 21st century notions.

There is even more adventure in this book than in the previous one, and I have to admit that I thought it was a bit too much of it. Danger after danger after danger, though I understand that's kind of how it worked way back in the day. 

Bottom Line: Though I liked Waterfall more, Cascade is a great continuation to the River of Time series and it does take you for quite a ride of adventure and romance. And I liked the twist at the end, it made sense for it to happen.