Review: The Dazzling Heights by Katharine McGee

The Thousandth Floor #2

New York City, 2118. Manhattan is home to a thousand-story supertower, a breathtaking marvel that touches the sky. But amid high-tech luxury and futuristic glamour, five teenagers are keeping dangerous secrets…

Leda is haunted by memories of what happened on the worst night of her life. She’ll do anything to make sure the truth stays hidden—even if it means trusting her enemy.

Watt just wants to put everything behind him…until Leda forces him to start hacking again. Will he do what it takes to be free of her for good?

When Rylin wins a scholarship to an upper-floor school, her life transforms overnight. But being there also means seeing the boy whose heart she broke, and who broke hers in return.

Avery is tormented by her love for the one person in the world she can never have. She’s desperate to be with him…no matter the cost.

And then there’s Calliope, the mysterious, bohemian beauty who arrives in New York determined to cause a stir. And she knows exactly where to begin.

But unbeknownst to them all, someone is watching their every move, someone with revenge in mind. After all, in a world of such dazzling heights, just one wrong step can mean a devastating fall.

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Book #2 in the The Thousandth Floor series. Once again we return to the beautiful 1000-floor tower constructed in Manhattan 2118. The elite are at the top while the rest are at the bottom. Continuing from where we left off in the first book, once again we dive into the drama and heartbreak of the elite, after the tragic events of the first book. Have they moved on? Or does everything just keep coming back to haunt them?

The Dazzling Heights really does describe the heights at which these characters stand. As we all know, the higher up you are, the harder you can fall. This is truly embodied in this novel. As each character struggles to continue their lives in the aftermath of what happened in the first novel, a new character comes into town to mess with everyone’s lives. Once again told through multiple POVs, the story is intricately woven together, and it is impossible to tell what will hold strong and what is about to break.

It’s always nice to see more character development in sequels. We don’t get too much from every single character, but there is some decided growth in some of them. I would say in this book, the story mainly revolves around Leda, a girl previously struggling with a drug addiction and with a serious propensity for using people’s secrets against them. In the confined space of the tower, it’s impossible to avoid anyone, even people you desperately don’t want to see. The glamour and appeal of this book for me was still really the whole sci-fi futuristic feel of the tower. It is just so similar to our own time, except just a little bit not, which makes it all the more intoxicating in its allure.

This truly was a continuation of the first book. It really felt like the first book had never stopped and just continued. The story writing and characters continue seamlessly, definitely as if no time has passed at all since the first story, which I really appreciated. I feel like sometimes series can sound very different from book to book which could be a stylistic choice, but I prefer something at least a little bit similar. Perhaps the romantic interests and relationships are a little bit cliché, but in terms of a YA book, I really don’t think it was that egregious. I was definitely not reading this series for the progression of its various relationship pairings.

The plot was pretty good as well. Nothing that moves extensively, but rather revolves on the ever changing emotions and relationships of these teenagers in relation to each other. I thought that the various plots and moving pieces were well put together and that it moved pretty seamlessly from POV to POV, stringing me along to keep reading. I would recommend this book for sure if you enjoyed the first one!

Overall Recommendations

The Dazzling Heights is the second book in The Thousandth Floor series. Revolving around rich elites living at the top of the thousand-floor tower and their messy lives and affairs, this book revolves around the aftermath of what happened on that fateful night at the top of the tower from book one. If you enjoyed the drama and ever shifting relationships or a ton of general teenaged issues like in the first book, then you’ll definitely enjoy this one too. Or if you, like me, enjoy the futuristic sci-fi where almost everything is at your fingertips or where technology makes anything possible, you will hopefully also enjoy this novel like I did!