The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater (review)

At the end of The Raven Boys (BCCB 9/12), readers learned that Ronan, the sarcastic private-school student, is the new Greywaren, having inherited his father's gift for bringing objects out of dreams. Unfortunately, very bad men are after the Greywaren, alerted by the erratic energy bursts along the newly awakened ley line in Virginia. The appearance of a particularly nasty hunter, known as the Gray Man, amps up the tension, especially when he discovers a mutual attraction to the mother of Blue, the psychically gifted townie girl who's befriended Ronan and his buddies Adam and Gansey. Blue and the boys' search for Glendower has always been a dangerous game, but now the danger has escalated; in addition to the men searching for the Greywaren, there is another dream thief who is tapping into the energy of the line for his own purposes. Meanwhile, Adam, who made the sacrifice that awakened the line, is still not sure what his role is, in either the magic realm or the human one, and Blue is becoming increasingly attracted to Gansey even though she knows that her kiss will kill him. After having so deftly introduced and developed this constellation of characters in the first novel, Stiefvater plies their strengths and weaknesses into an ever more complex web of magical intrigue and heartstopping action. In this sequel, every character, except the ones disposed of in the previous book, has an increasingly important role to play, and the new characters the author introduces are just right for moving her plot lines forward and drawing out productive tensions between the ordinary world of rural Virginia and the wild, magical world they have awakened but have not yet learned to navigate. Plot and pacing are perfect, and there are just enough threads plucked from the weave to stimulate breathless desire for the sequel.