Copperhead (Ironskin #2) by Tina Connolly

Series: Ironskin #2
304p.
Publisher: Tor Books
Available Now
Source: From publisher for review

Helen Huntingdon is beautiful—so beautiful she has to wear an iron mask. Six months ago her sister Jane uncovered a fey plot to take over the city. Too late for Helen, who opted for fey beauty in her face—and now has to cover her face with iron so she won’t be taken over, her personality erased by the bodiless fey. 

Not that Helen would mind that some days. Stuck in a marriage with the wealthy and controlling Alistair, she lives at the edges of her life, secretly helping Jane remove the dangerous fey beauty from the wealthy society women who paid for it. But when the chancy procedure turns deadly, Jane goes missing—and is implicated in the murder. 

Meanwhile, Alistair’s influential clique Copperhead—whose emblem is the poisonous copperhead hydra—is out to restore humans to their “rightful” place, even to the point of destroying the dwarvven who have always been allies. 

Helen is determined to find her missing sister, as well as continue the good fight against the fey. But when that pits her against her own husband—and when she meets an enigmatic young revolutionary—she’s pushed to discover how far she’ll bend society’s rules to do what’s right. It may be more than her beauty at stake. It may be her honor...and her heart.

My thoughts:
I read the first book Ironskin and I just loved the cover. I like this cover too, but I admit not as much. Now to what is inside that cover. :)

If you didn't already know, this is a retelling of Jane Eyre. The characters names are the same, but the relationships are very different. And although we get some of the same personalities, they are also quite different. In this one we follow Helen who we did not get to know much past childhood in the original book. In this series, Helen is selfish, beautiful, and vain. She also has quite a bit of a self esteem problem. This can be a problem for a character unless they have a lot of growth in the story. Rest assured, she does grow exponentially.

My biggest problems stem from some of her relationships. I would have liked to have had them further developed. Rook is an interesting character, but he just seemed a bit underdeveloped for me. Granted he was a secondary character, but an important one. I didn't quite buy their romance nor he ability to keep within society with her background. I also didn't get all my questions answered about Jane from the first book and this one even added a couple. Hopefully there will be further installments where I will finally get those answers. Still, I do enjoy growth in a book so these problems didn't seem overly pronounced to me.

I give this book 3 1/2 stars. I enjoyed it more than the first book, and I enjoyed this ending much more than the first. I still want that ending in the first book (you will probably know what I'm referring if you have read the book) explained. Looking forward in getting those answers. :)