Oh that’s quite an ending. After Shadow and Bone set the stage and Siege and Storm raised the stakes, Ruin and Rising really brings everything home.

We have the increasing religious fever of Alina as Saint–whether or not that’s what she wants.

We have what’s left of Alina’s friends and allies trying desperately to hold off the ever more powerful–and ever more unhinged–Darkling.

We finally get some real history, digging deeper into where the Darkling came from… and perhaps how Alina fits into it all as well.

We have more adventures; a desperate bid to find the third Amplifier that may well save the day–or doom them all.

And finally–obvious seeing as it’s the final novel in the trilogy–we have victory. But at what cost.

It’s by a decent margin my favorite of the three. A solid conclusion, in my opinion. Now I’m looking forward to the other series in the same world. Six of Crows especially to see where those threads in the show came from and King of Scars for a ‘what comes next’. Onward!

Things I particularly liked:

• Nikolai. He’s just a lot of fun–and by the end gets quite the arc.

• The Darkling. With what we learn of his childhood and the effects of a very long life–it all makes sense. And I feel for him. He’s still totally the villain of the piece and needs to lose though.

  “In this moment he was just a boy -brilliant, blessed with too much power, burdened by eternity.”

• Genya and David. They’re my favorites.

  “Na razrusha’ya. I am not ruined. E’ya razrushost. I am ruination.”

  and

  “Beauty was your armor. Fragile stuff, all show. But what’s inside you? That’s steel. It’s brave and unbreakable. And it doesn’t need fixing.”

• Mal. He’s better. I wish Alina would just accept him as he is (and Mal would accept her as she is for that matter). But he’s better at least.

Things I didn’t:

• Happy endings that cheapen the big sacrifice. For that matter; having to give it all up at the end... for reasons?

• The love mess. The Darkling never really worked, but otherwise I could see either path working out in the long run. But not both. I get it’s a common YA thing, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. 😄