Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo
Locate the entrance to the underworld. Take a soul from hell. A straightforward approach, but few individuals who travel this way return. Galaxy “Alex” Stern, however, is committed to rescuing Darlington from purgatory, even at the expense of her future at Lethe and at Yale.
Alex and Dawes put together a group of dubious allies to save the gentleman of Lethe because they are forbidden from trying to perform a rescue and they are unable to ask the Ninth House for assistance. Together, they must work through a maze of strange objects and occult literature to discover the organizations’ most closely-guarded secrets—breaking every rule in the process. Alex, however, realizes these aren’t merely accidents as faculty members start to disappear.
If she is to survive, she will have to face the demons from her past and an evil ingrained in the university’s very walls. Something dreadful is at work in New Haven. Hell Bent depicts a complex world filled with magic, bloodshed, and all-too-real monsters. It is rich in history and full of Bardugo’s trademark twists.
Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo
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Hell Bent chronicles Alex Stern’s tenacity in getting Virgil back to her Dante at Lethe. At Yale University, where eight strong houses, or societies, use the arcane and magic to manipulate reality, predict the future, or otherwise ensure that its graduates continue to lead lives of privilege and riches, Lethe is the ninth house, or supervision house, introduced in the first novel. Lethe keeps an eye on their rituals and workings to keep them hidden from prying eyes and unharmed by occult forces that might disrupt or mess with the magic essential to the ceremonies and rites being conducted in secret by these eight houses inside the historic tombs and classrooms buildings at Yale University.
Daniel Arlington, Alex Stern’s Lethe mentor, is sucked through some sort of portal in the middle of the first book. Alex is determined to save Darlington and return him to his family with the aid of Lethe’s Oculus, Pam Dawes. Alex isn’t having it because the circumstances surrounding this seemingly random event seem suspect. Numerous barriers, some of which date back to the past, stand in the way of this objective.
There is fallout from Alex’s gruesome and unsettling past as a strung-out teen in California, as well as the mistrust and resistance Alex and Dawes encounter from the adults in the Lethe organization, from the Lethe-liaison police detective they collaborated with to solve a murder in book one, Ninth House, to the faculty and university administrators within whose purview they must operate and who discourage investigation and sadly shake their heads and write off a young man’s loss.
As determined as Alex and the reluctant group of other characters are to return Darlington to his family, their goal becomes incredibly difficult and nearly impossible to imagine when it becomes clear that they must steal Darlington’s soul back from hell itself and that they won’t be the first Yale students to travel to the underworld and back. What cost are they willing to incur in order to rescue Darlington, Lethe’s “golden boy” who was purposefully drawn into the demonic realm? Fast-moving, urgent, and exciting action is present.
