Alexandra Bracken’s Never Fade is the second book in the Darkest Mindstrilogy. Never Fade picks up a six months after the events of The Darkest Minds. Ruby joins the Children’s League to keep them from going after Liam. The Children’s League has taught her how to control her powers, shoot a gun, and work together with other kids from the Children’s League. She performs many Ops and is soon entrusted with an important and secret Op. One that has her traveling across the country to locate Liam, who unknowingly holds information that can change the world.
Ruby has changed a lot in the six months between the two books. In The Darkest Minds, Ruby is terrified of her powers. She only uses them in self-defense and feels like a monster at for both having and using her powers. In Never Fade, Ruby is forced to use her powers for the Children’s League. She leads several dangerous missions. She breaks into and destroys the minds of her enemies. She still feels like a monster, especially when she destroys someone’s mind, but she is also willing to do anything to keep her friends alive. Her protective nature is more evident than ever in this installment. In The Darkest Minds Ruby used her powers as a last resort because she didn’t want to isolate herself from the only people that cared for her. Now, her friends know what she is capable of, so she is slightly more inclined to use her powers if anyone threatens the one she loves.
Alexandra Bracken doesn’t disappoint with this sequel story. Never Fade is one of the few books that are better than its predecessor. There was a lot of backstory and world-building in The Darkest Minds. With this world established, Never Fade has lots of room for an action filled plot. Both books have a lot of car travel and road trips. In Never Fade, the trip is made more exciting by having lots of conflicts interfering with Ruby’s journey. During the trip, it is easy to get emotionally invested in the characters. Each character has a developed personality and Alexandra Bracken does an amazing job of making you care about what happens to the characters. This book is full of tension and plot twists that will keep you hooked from start to finish. It is a constant action packed adventure and a worthy successor to The Darkest Minds. I give this 507 page book 5 stars.
Series Analysis
The Darkest Minds is an amazing trilogy. In this dystopian or post-apocalyptic world, many children have been infected with a disease know as IAAN (Idiopathic Adolescent Acute Neurodegeneration). While the disease kills most kids, those who survive have amazing psychic abilities. Sadly, many of these survivors are sent to labor camps. This series is full of dimensional characters with traumatic pasts and deep emotions, plot twists that will tear apart your heart, and a fast paced story telling. It is an amazing series that has won 4.35 stars on goodreads and a perfect 5 stars on this site. This book combines fantasy with a dystopian setting and is recommended for anyone who is a lover of those genres.
The Darkest Minds
The Darkest Minds series takes place in a dystopian world. Many of the children in this world are infected with Idiopathic Adolescent Acute Neurodegeneration (IAAN). Those who survive IAAN have psychic abilities and sent to labor camps where they are closed off from society. The ways the childern manifest their powers is determined by color. Blues are telekinetic, Greens have photographic memory and are incredibly smart, Yellows are electro kinetic (have power of electricity), Oranges can control a person’s thoughts and actions as well as see into a person’s mind, and Reds can create and control fire. Kids who escaped form tribes and the Children's League works to free the children, but don't really offer the kids the freedom they promise.