The Sin Collector

THIS CONTAINS SPOILERS*I went into this book thinking what an interesting concept it was. However, it didn’t really live up to what I had envisioned, but maybe lack of backstory, and some of the questions will be rounded out & explained in the next book . It was certainly an interesting read. Liliana, or LiLi as Billy called her is a Collector. She takes on all the sins a person has before they die. She is basically immortal, the only thing that can kill her is the Castus dagger long thought to be gone forever. 

She has lived for over 120 years, and seen the best and the worst in mankind. After seeing all the death and destruction in WWII she stopped taking on others’ sins. She is trying to live as normal a  life as she can, considering she  can sense everyone's sins. She is getting by until she runs into Billy, her first and only friend she had growing up. He too is a sin-eater, better known as a Collector. He lures her into believing that everything she knows is a lie; which is fairly close to the truth. She never had to take on anyone else’s sin; Billy didn’t. She become extremely frustrated with her former mentor, Olexander for never telling her these things.

All mentors leave the trainees after the trainee turns 20. This is when they have to learn to fend for themselves and begin to collect others’ sins. As Billy brings LiLi over to Dublin to supposedly relax while he visits with his mother (since no two Collectors can be in the same room without becoming physically ill). She passes out in a pub, because of another Collector being there. Billy believes that the Castus, a group of humans, who believe that Collectors should be eradicated, is nearby. As they begin to hunt for clues, Olexander and a group of Collectors pop up. LiLi is caught in the middle of Billy and Olexander. Each is telling her not to trust the other, and she begins to doubt who to place her trust in.

As the story continues, this is where I begin to have issues with it. Billy is the traitor; the Castus killed his mother and now he’s serving them. Why would anyone, especially someone who knows the history of the Collectors and the Castsus choose to serve them after watching his mother die a painful death? The author didn’t do a good job truly explaining why Billy would do this, and turn his old friend LiLi over to them? Was he truly that brainwashed?

Also, why is the Castus making a comeback now? They haven’t been around since before LiLi was born. Again the author provides no explanation.  I do like that LiLi was able to see people’s auras, but why did that happen? Maybe that will be explained in the next book. Rebecca, had that same gift, but she was extremely old, while LiLi is still quite young for a Collector. Also, it was interesting that Quinlan’s aura was red and orange, while another character who was not nearly as evil had black around his aura. That seemed a little strange, I felt like Quinlan should have been the one with black intermixed with his aura. However, that’s just my opinion; the author could have had her own reason for showing Quinlan’s aura the way she did.

I will admit, I did cry at the very beginning of the book when George died. For some reason it really struck a chord with me, and I loved how he didn’t want LiLi to take his sins. That is a life well spent in my estimation.  Overall, I would read the second book just to see if my questions are answered, but I’m not waiting for it on baited breath.

Grammatically, I didn’t notice a lot of errors. The one thing I did notice was that when the pdf format converted itself on my Nook, only 2 lines were typed before a space interrupted them. I felt like I was reading poetry. However, I believe that is purely a formatting issue with trying to read a pdf on a Nook. I doubt that the book is actually written like that.