Nocturne by Christine Johnson

Published: August 23 2011

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Pages: 368

e-copy: Courtesy of Simon and Schuster galley grab

Summary: Goodreads

After the tragic events of the summer, Claire is looking forward to a new school year. All she wants to worry about is finding the most gorgeous dress to wear to the Autumn Ball with her perfect boyfriend. But as Claire knows all too well, the life of a werewolf is never that simple, or that sweet.


When Claire’s human and wolf lives start to collide, her worst nightmares come true. She is hurting her best friend. She has been caught lying. And then the unthinkable happens: Someone discovers Claire’s secret.


If Claire’s werewolf identity is exposed, everyone she knows will be put at risk. And the pack’s response comes at a cost higher than Claire can imagine. Claire will be forced to determine just how far she is willing to go

Nocturne is the follow up to Christine Johnson's Claire de Lune (my review HERE) and I was looking forward to reading more about Claire and Matthew.  Unfortunately, Nocturne fell a little short for me, as I felt there really was not a lot going on at the beginning of the book.  In fact I got to page 182 and there still didn't seem to be much going on.  The tension that was almost palpable in Claire de Lune was missing this time around and to be honest, for me Claire''s character seemed to be a bit whiny.  I couldn't understand what was going on with Matthew and his seeming reluctance to have anything to do with his role as Gardien to the werewolf pack.  I also found myself a little confused over Amy, she was something of an anomaly for me - was she genuine or faking?

Now having said all this, it did hold my interest enough to keep reading and  as I got to the last 100 or so pages everything came sharply into focus and suddenly made sense.  The tension ratcheted up several notches and I was very keen to see what was going to happen.   There's a nice little message in there about how dangerous it can be to jump to conclusions (both in the book and for myself!).  So in the end I did enjoy it, and I would encourage anyone reading it to keep going - the end really does justify the reading in this case.