As book five completed the main and primary arc of the Elemental Assassin series, By a Thread must not only deal with the aftermath of the death of a crime boss, but also justify the continuation of the series when most of the loose ends have been tied up. One way Jennifer Estep does this is by retconning Bria’s character so she, once again, has unresolved baggage with Gin. Despite Bria seemingly making peace with Gin’s violent occupation and accepting her as a sister, thereby proving she is better the Donovan Caine, she once again hates Gin’s profession and blames Gin for Mab torturing her. This annoying character change becomes more infuriating as Gin repeatedly beats herself up about Bria’s condemnation. As annoying as Bria is, she cannot hold a candle to Donovan Caine. Yes, the asshole detective makes a comeback further complicating Gin’s life and the story itself. Gin must somehow overcome her past with Donovan Caine as well as repair her relationship with Bria.
By a Thread is a book that invokes mixed feelings. On one hand, it follows many of the same formula that made the previous installments enthralling. Like all its predecessors, the book starts immediately with a fight to kick start the plot. Although the book meanders a bit as it changes location, once the main conflict is introduced, there is nonstop action until the final page.
The book also does a decent job of setting up a new villain that is just as psychotic if not more so than Mab Monroe. Although Gin displays an uncharacteristic amount of arrogance in this book which, unsurprisingly, gets her into trouble, the book does establish the theme that Mab Monroe is not the most powerful person in the world. Other villains exist and they can be just as bad or worse if Gin lets her guard down.
Unfortunately, this is where a lot of the good ends. As expected, Jennifer Estep is annoyingly repetitive as she constantly recaps events that happed in previous chapters or informs readers about the number of Silverstone knives Gin carries or that Gin has unresolved conflicts with certain characters.
Another annoyance is the supposed change in location. Gin left Ashland in order to leave her life of violence behind for a bit. While there isn’t a single person who thought Gin was actually going to get a break from violence, I was hoping that the change in location might bring something new to the story or expand on the world of vampires, elementals, dwarfs. Unfortunately, this book is literally just the beach themed version of Ashland with some extra character drama thrown in for kicks and giggles. The only difference between Ashland and Blue Marsh is the beach theme and how no one knows Gin Blanco’s relation to the Spider.
The most annoying part about this book is that it doesn’t need to exist. In Spider’s Revenge, Gin Blanco killed Mab Monroe, established a friendly relationship with her sister Bria, and allowed herself to accept Owen into her life. Every major story thread has been dealt with, so By a Thread must establish new conflicts and set up new villains. Unfortunately, every conflict in this book felt forced and manufactured. As mention previously, Bria was retconned into hating her sister, so she can act as mirror to Donovan Caine, a man who had already served his narrative purpose and didn’t need to be in the story. While Donovan’s character could be redeeming in previous books if you thought of things from his perspective, in this book he was a complete and utter prick. His confused, lust-filled hatred of Gin caused him to actively get in the way all attempts to save this story’s innocent in question.
Despite my many complaints about this book, it is simply mirroring its predecessors. All the books in the Elemental Assassin series are not good. They are not intellectually or emotionally stimulating, nor are they complex or engaging. They are trashy fun. They are YA novels with some extra sex and violence thrown in for an older audience. While it is perfectly okay to have fun sometimes, it is possible to have fun without being overdramatic and destroying narrative consistency. While a fun read, this book does not need to exist.
I give this 356 page book 3 stars.