Crafting An Antagonist
Having done some magnificent character-building in the last book, Head Games instead shifts its focus to its late-introduced villain and to better establish this character and what effect it will have on the story as a whole. A necessary aspect of telling a story, although not necessarily a pleasant one (in how it makes you feel).
The beauty of this villain who I will call Dodge for the sake of simplicity (I'm not sure what their actual name is) is that there's no sympathy for them which is how I believe more villains should be. The character doesn't actually make me feel good at all when they slither their way on stage and in fact, a lot of the things Dodge does in this book actually makes me feel real dread which is something only the best horror can accomplish. I think what helps make Dodge's crimes against others all the worse is you get to see into their lives and see how things weren't good even before he came along to take things to even more awful places. You feel actual fear for his victims, especially Rufus (for me personally), I'm almost scared to continue reading because I don't want anything bad to happen to him!
I think the premise of this new key was actually a very interesting one although at this point it just encourages the idea that this antagonist is far above the kids and at this point I honestly have no idea how this series could have a happy ending but I guess that's what future installments for. I think my favorite moment with the new key (besides all the nice bits of fun, brief though they were) is when Kinsey took her fear and self-deprecation out of her head and placed them in a bottle and they continued to interact, showing us the awful things she was going through internally all along.
I think the only part of this book that felt out of place for me was Duncan, while not a major complaint, I thought his whole story revolving around his homosexuality was a little too stereotypical and doesn't help encourage the idea people of minorities lead normal lives (I mean yes a lot of them very much face unprovoked hatred and abuse but the scenario used felt too cliche). I'll leave that one to see how things develop but it didn't really evolve the character in any way or relate to the rest of the story and instead just focused on these hick girls (that you would assume were lesbians based on stereotypes) stalking him and his boyfriend, plotting them harm and misunderstandings causing tragedy.
In conclusion, the art and writing remain some of the best and I couldn't drop this series at this point because it's not one of those you can hope to find in equal caliber at random, it's definitely well above the average. Though I don't recommend to people who want to feel happy all the time (if they exist?).