Unlike Fable, Namesake's predecessor, Namesake captured my attention from the very beginning. Fable required a couple of chapters to really get into the meat of the story, while this sequel drops the reader right into a couple of shocking twists as well as the arrival of a frustrating character from the first book. The writing is the lush and lyrical style that we're accustomed to from Adrienne Young in her previous offerings, providing a smooth reading experience. Namesake is a treat in that it has something special to it that Fable lacked; a cohesive, character-driven plot, to start with. There's a new villain or two to contend with, in a world that has opened up with a shift in Fable's motivations. I thoroughly enjoyed Adrienne Young's newest offering, and I look forward to more books by her in the future.

The Perfect conclusion to this Pirate-esque duology. Although, I'd love to read more about Fable, I'm fully satisfied. I wish I could go island hopping or smell the sea. 5/5 fully recommend this series for winter escapism.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/53138025-namesake

I received an ARC of this from Netgalley and I loved it. Namesake is one of the rare occasions where the sequel is better than the first book. Young weaves together so many intriguing plotlines and really creates a complex and strong character in her protagonist, Fable. It was, at times, a little too convenient when everything kept working out for Fable and her crew, but I personally enjoyed it and am a little tired of YA fantasy series where nothing seems to go right for the characters. This was so engaging that I finished it in a day.

Namesake was so much better than Fable in my opinion. Fable left me with wondering if Namesake would be any good as Fable just wasn't enough of everything to me & I was bored with it half the time. But Namesake was a book that held interest so much more. Which is definitely a good thing when it's a duology. You want the second book to be great and close the story properly. you want it to feel finished. Namesake did all that and more. So much more intrigue, action, family ties, love, fighting, power struggles, wealth, trickery. I'm glad Adrienne saved all the good stuff for Namesake & maybe she purposely put more into it than fable. Or it could of been all the hype that fable received that made the book a let down to me when I read it. Namesake on the other hand is well deserved of any hype and I hope other readers feel it had the work of greatness in it's pages.
I would love if Adrienne wrote a prequel or two in the future for this duology. Isolde & Saint's younger lives until Fable is born would be a great tale or West & Willa's story would be nice to know more of. But Really Isolde & Saint's is what I'd be most interested in.
I was given this ARC of Namesake to leave my personal opinion & thoughts in review by NetGalley, Wednesday books, St. Martin's publishing group.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy of Namesake. My spoiler free review is below.

Namesake is just as action packed and stunning as Fable. It is the best kind of sequel that takes the world you grew to love in a book and cracks it open to reveal a much larger and engaging world. The character growth and revelations in this book make the expanded world even better. Namesake was honestly just a joy to read.

Namesake was even better than its predecessor and that is hard to find in stories with multiple installments.

Once again the reader is thrust back into the works of pirates where very little is what it seems. The larger focus of this book seems to be Fable’s relationship with her father. Watching that relationship grow and evolve as Fable came into her own is a journey I could go on again and again.

I was a little out off by how neatly everything wrapped up but it felt right. Fable’s journey feels complete with this installment as much as I want to go back to her world and experience more. I would love to know more about Fable’s mother’s story which is still left very unknown in Namesake as well.

What to say? This was a great ending to a great duet... I loved meeting Fable's grandmother and getting to know her father better!

This was certainly a wild ride as we uncovered mystery after mystery and learnt more about Fable's mothers past. I throughly enjoyed this story and was captivated the whole way through... West and Fable were both equally fierce and both fought for each other so well. I also loved that their was redemption for characters had been written off as bad in the first on and I loved the plan that had been set in motion for years! This is such a excellent well rounded book that people of all ages will love,

I loved that this book wrapped everything up so well, but not in a way that felt rushed or trite. Another excellent fantasy story from Adrienne Young, she is an author whose work I will always pick up!

Namesake is a must read conclusion to this duology. It was action packed from the first page to the end. It was great returning to this seafaring world with Saint, Fable, West and the rest of the crew from the Marigold.

I love that in Namesake we get to see more of Fables family history, learning about her mom and her side of the family... but even more than that I loved seeing more of Saint.. I knew there was more to him that what we saw in Fable. The love between West and Fable grows, and we see what they are willing to do, so that they can stay together forever.

Namesake picks up right where Fable leaves off with Fable waking up on the deck of a ship tied to the mast. She has been kidnapped my Zola and he says he will let her go, if she does somethings for him. While she is stuck there for the time being she never stops thinking of how she can escape and find her way back to West. Little does she know that she is in the middle of a plot by two different people, and that when they finally run there course things for Fable and what she knows about her own family will end up changing things forever.

I can't wait for this book to be released, I will definitely be buying it and reading this duology again and again.

What a fantastic conclusion to this duology. This book picks up right where the first ended. The continuing pirate adventure of a gem sage/dredger and her sort-of crew and her incredibly complicated family history. Wow! This book kind of floored me, to be honest. One of the more stunning and immersive YAs that I've read in a while. Fable is everything I would want in a heroine and believe me when I say that Adrienne Young completely transported me to world of pirates and gem traders and reef divers/dredgers and horizons of all oceans and murder and betrayal.

Abandoned by her father at thirteen after the death of her mother at sea, Fable has scraped a living in a small and brutal island town by dredging for pyre in the ocean. She's been planning to escape to find her father, finally getting her chance when she flees a rival dredger determined to kill her by jumping aboard a trader's ship and paying him everything she owns to get off the island. The adventure she embarks upon is not one that she was expecting and is probably one of my favorite ocean setting books I've ever read. I could smell the salt in the air, feel the cool spray off the prow, hear the rhythmic lapping of the waves in my sleep. I kid you not - I had not one but TWO ocean dreams in the three days that I was reading this book.

This was loads of fun and I loved every minute of it!

Non Bias Review in exchange for an E-ARC.

This book was a perfect conclusion to the world we were introduced to in Fable. Not only did we get to see our favorite characters and get to the bottom of that crazy cliffhanger from book 1 but we get to explore a lor more of the world Adrianne Young has created. We get some shocking reveals about Fable and her family that completely make sense and you finally get to answer some of those questions you had about where she got her powers from.
I loved everything about this book and will definitely recommend it to everyone.
Thank you so much for the Advanced Copy.

Namesake could not be anything less than a 5 star for me . It had the suspense that I love , with a little touch of romance , and character growth .
This was a happy , fun and beautifully written story about a young girl who finds the inner strength and power to become something more , someone more . The strong female lead is built throughout the series and I loved watching her grow .
Adrienne Young really did an excellent job with these books and I look forward to reading more of her work in the future .

Absolutely wonderful sequel and conclusion to this amazing duology! Adrienne Young is so talented and Namesake is *definitely* proof. I expect not only high demand for this, but for her (equally well written) backlist as well.

I love characters like Fable (strange name notwithstanding). She's determined, intelligent, loyal, and hard-working. Namesake has all the same things I loved about the first book: fast-paced plot, morally ambiguous characters who veer from hero to villain and back again, political intrigue.

Fable has been my favorite book that I have read in a while and Namesake did not disappoint as the sequel. I have always had an affinity for the ocean and pirates and this duology just made that love more prominent. The adventure and secrets shared in this book made you feel like you were out in the towns and sea with these characters, who now have a special place in my heart. I love the dynamics that Adrienne Young created for the crew and it was fun to learn more about their backgrounds. The evolution of Fable's relationships with Saint and West was fun to read and gave me the information that I was searching for in the first book.

Fable is such a strong, interesting character and it was exciting to watch her become more sure of herself and her abilities. I have recommended these books to everyone who will listen and I look forward to reading more from Adrienne Young in the future. Also, can we talk about the covers? They are beautiful!

Absolutely loved this sequel to Fable. Fast paced and instantly addictive. I wish she would write more for this series!

First of all, thanks to netgalley for providing me with an ARC.

Did I stay up all night to finish this? Yes, yes I did, it was that good!

After falling into a bookhangover after reading the first part, the second book did not disappoint and I’m so excited for everyone else to read it! Quick pace, amazing descriptions of ship-trading and Caribbean-esque seas, with the right amount of scheming and love! Perfect!

Fable will learn some shocking information. If you read the last book you know she was left a bit stranded. Well that does not go well for her, and it gets worse. She might have to sell her soul to save something she loves. There is so much in the balance and she has no idea of what’s being played.
Fable has grown up a lot since the first book. She’s not so soft in this book, good thing too because she needs to be. It was coming at Fable trying take her down all through the book. If they didn’t want to own her, they wanted to use her, lie to her and manipulate her. The past was not the truth she thought it was, oh the lies !
West, he is not the man he appeared to be. I still struggle with the relationship. I never did get where it grew from but it’s there and strong. He revealed himself more and what is shown isn’t pretty. I’m still on the fence on him, he reads a bit obsessive to me. We’ll see
I really enjoyed this book much more than book 1. In that book I struggled believing in these characters.This one was more evolved. The action was intense, and believable. The struggles were heartbreaking and the moments of joy heartwarming. I look forward for the next book in the series
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher for an honest review

Namesake just hits hard. Even months after I finished reading, I'm still obsessed with the characters and world (*cut to me staring lovingly at my preorder artwork of Fable and West*) so much that I recommend this series to everyone I meet. I don't often review more than one book in a series, but Wednesday Books has so generously shared an ARC with me that I am elated to shout all possible praise into the internet void.

It's a bit challenging to find different points to remark on from my first review, since one thing Young does so well is continuity. I read Namesake only a few months after Fable, and it felt like I was stepping into a familiar embrace. If you haven't read my Fable review, then that's a good place to start since I'll be touching on a few ways Namesake does well as a sequel. Of course, if you haven't read Fable... what are you doing?? Go! My review will still be here when you come back!

All that I loved from the first book continues here--Fable is beyond reproach as a narrator. She navigates trader politics and the open ocean in Namesake, taking everything on with courage and confidence. I'd wilt in the face of half of Fable's adventures, so I think this is a mark in her favor. She makes missteps but atones for them, like any good character does. I'm not upset that Fable isn't morally grey--I love that type of character but I think her style is perfect for the novel, and we need a healthy balance in YA. I'm not saying some of her actions aren't... dubious... but she's not exactly Kaz Brekker and I love her for it. At any rate, I think you're all here to see me talk about...

West!!! If I thought this series couldn't get any more swoon-worthy, I was dead wrong. He remains one of my favorite YA love interests. Even in an established relationship, there was enough tension riding on Fable and West's relationship to keep me on my toes. I do love a good swashbuckling romance, and Namesake certainly delivered. I'm hoping and praying that there's another art print preorder campaign because I would sign up in a heartbeat! (Review written in January 2021, campaign not yet announced) I need Fable/West like I need air. These two found each other at the perfect moment in their lives, and I'm a sucker for stories that explore what it means to look for a home outside of your circumstances. They put so much on the line for each other always, so that the whole story has a deep emotional core rooted in finding love. That just gets me every time.

The other element I enjoyed about Namesake is the fast-paced plot. We continue exploring with the Marigold's crew, and meet some new characters, but this novel is plot-focused and less introspective. It ties seamlessly into Fable, as I mentioned earlier, so that they both feel like two halves of the same book. If you liked The Bone Witch and Rin Chupeco's integrated storytelling (minus the flashbacks), you'll definitely enjoy Fable. The one major character-development arc we get is more of Fable's relationship with her father. This aspect intrigued me in the first novel, but in Namesake gets so much more depth and page time that I simply couldn't leave it out of my review. Since it wasn't what originally hooked me on Fable, I never mentioned it in that review and I'll call it a pleasant surprise for Namesake. As you might expect from the synopsis, this is a complex duo that certainly benefitted from the extra scenes.

You won't be surprised to hear that I'm giving Namesake another 5/5 stars. It's a perfect novel, and you all should go order Fable (and preorder Namesake) right now.

THANKYOU NETGALLEY for giving me the chance to read this sequel!!! I LOVE this duology so much. The plot, the caracters, everything! Namesake was amazing and a great end. I'm sad its finished. But I'm glad I've met Fable and the Crew. And to read their adventures. Thankyou Adrienne Young !!!

I loved the first book in this duology, and this one was great as well! I definitely preferred the first one, but I did like how we learned more about the characters in this one and how we were able to find out some more about the world. I think there was a very satisfying ending, and I really enjoyed the action scenes that we did get!

Coverage for Frolic can be found here: https://frolic.media/perfect-pairings-books-and-candle-scents/

Thank you again!