I received this book for free from Reviewer Purchase in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Born of Deception by Teri Brown
Series: Born of Illusion #2
Published by Balzer + Bray on 6/10/14
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Historical, Mystery & Detective, Paranormal, Romance, Young Adult
Pages: 341
Format: Ebook
Source: Reviewer Purchase
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After scoring a spot on a European vaudeville tour, Anna Van Housen is moving to London to chase her dream and to join an underground society for people like her with psychic abilities. But when Anna arrives, she finds the group in turmoil—one of its members has been kidnapped, and members of the society are starting to turn on one another. Her life in danger and her relationship with her boyfriend, Cole, fizzling, can Anna track down the kidnapper before he makes her his next victim—or will she be forced to pay the ultimate price for her powers?

Short and Sweet Review

Anna is in London after she got a spot with European Vaudeville tour, and she found an underground society with people like her with psychic abilities. When Anna gets to London she learns that things aren’t so great within the society, one of the members was kidnapped and the others aren’t sure if they can trust each other, to make matters worse her relationship with Cole isn’t going the way she wants. Anna wants to find whoever the kidnapper is before anyone else especially her becomes the next victim.

Born of Deception had the same problem Born of Illusion did for me, there wasn’t a lot going on. Anna is in London she’s apart of this tour to do magic and show off her abilities, and she’s also in with the society with other people with psychic abilities. The book has a good premise about someone being kidnapped and Anna trying to find the kidnapper but she’s not a detective and there wasn’t a lot of investigating on her part. We also have her romantic interest Cole who actually is investigating the missing person. Anna and Cole are supposed to be a thing but I don’t think it’s official which was ridiculous because those two lost it when they saw the other talking to someone who could have been considered another romantic interest. There was a bit of a love triangle between Anna, Cole, and a guy named Billy. I think this aspect is to blame for the book being subpar because Anna was jealous and thinking about Cole just brought her mood down. Anyway we see Anna do some magic tricks, meet other people in the society, and attempt to solve a mystery. The pacing of this book is slow and I think if there was more investigating it really would have picked things up.

Overall, I didn’t have the highest expectations for this book, but I was hoping that it would be better than the first book. I don’t think this duology was for me, I genuinely feel like there wasn’t a lot going on plot wise and that just made the book seem slow and dull.