Onyx Storm (Climax, Part 2 - Chapters 61, 63 & 65)
STATS
Title: Onyx Storm
Series: The Empyrean (Book 3)
Author(s): Rebecca Yarros
Genre: Fantasy (Epic)
First Printing: January 2025
Publisher: Red Tower Books
Rating: 1.5 / 10
SPOILER WARNING
Heavy spoilers will be provided for the entirety of The Empyrean up through the end of the content covered in this part. Mild spoilers for elements later in Onyx Storm may be provided, but I will keep the first paragraph of each section as spoiler-free as possible. Heavy spoilers from later in Onyx Storm will be confined to clearly labelled sections.
Because we are skipping over Chapters 62 and 64 for now, this does mean there will be spoilers for chapters that we haven’t yet reviewed. I will be keeping these spoilers to the bare minimum needed to provide context for the chapters we’re here to discuss.
STRUCTURE
This part of the review will specifically cover the three chapters of the book from POV characters other than Violet. These are rammed into and after Violet’s final showdown with Theophanie. We will structure this part as follows:
Yarros’s stated justification for why she did this
A breakdown of each chapter
An analysis of whether Yarros’s stated justification holds up
THE VARIETY ARTICLE
Yarros's justification for ramming new POVs into her climax comes from her interview with Variety in January 2025.
We got two new POVs in this book beyond Violet and Xaden: Rhiannon and Imogen. Why did you pick these two characters?
I fought for that really hard in my draft to keep it because I figured that one of the lessons Violet is learning is that she cannot be all things to all people. And I do find that sometimes heroines get overpowered where they are the only one who may accomplish this. And that’s not how it works in a military unit. You have to delegate. And her mission is to go over here and take out this one objective which leaves all of this major battle happening without Violet present. And I kind of think cinematically, as I’m writing, I would want to know what’s happening back there. And the most logical choice is really that Violet believes that Rhi is the best of them, and to go back into Rhi’s head and see how Rhi is also, while outwardly very confident, struggling with, “Are these the right decisions? Is this leadership? Is this what I should be doing?” And seeing her evolve through that scene and her relationship with Feirge.
And then going into Imogen’s head, I knew that Imogen was where I wanted to be, because she knows things that other people don’t. She’s a marked one. And she’s one of my favorite characters, she has been since Book 1. And that evolution of where she first steps onto that mat with Violet in Book 1, versus where she’s standing with Violet at the end of Book 3, is one of my favorite arcs, and I knew that needed to come from her. Plus, there’s a moment where she gives up her dagger because we need more power to power these wards. And to me, it’s very symbolic of what the marked ones have done, which is continuously give away this power to try and shield others and defend others. And for it to be Imogen that does it was symbolic to me.
Yarros was also asked about additional POVs for future books.
Any plans to explore even more points of view in Book 4?
I think I left myself some really great opportunities.
Keep this it in the back of your mind as we go over these events.
CHAPTER 61 - RHIANNON
Story
Rhiannon worries about Violet, her squad, and her objective to protect the refugees from Draithus while also engaging in aerial combat with wyverns.
Plot
What we have here isn’t bad. It’s just that it’s a snapshot of a battle in progress. There’s no setup. There’s no resolution. What we have here is a chunk of a different story that was glued into Onyx Storm’s climax.
On a related note, while the action is entertaining enough, there’s very little to maintain emotional investment. Sure, Rhiannon’s a more likeable character than Violet, but nothing that’s happening here feels relevant to the wider narrative. We took a break from a fight that had become noise to engage with yet more noise.
Character
Rhiannon
There is a discernable difference between Rhiannon’s narrative voice and Violet’s. It’s not a massive difference, yet it is enough that she feels properly grounded in this world in a way that Violet never has. She reads like a person who grew up in Navarre's culture, and she also feels like someone for whom being a dragon rider is more than an excuse to screech about what she “deaerves”.
Feirge
Rhiannon’s dragon annoys me - not because she is badly written, but because she is proof that Yarros can do better when it comes to writing dragons. In this one brief chapter, using nothing but character voice relayed through snatches of generic dialogue, Yarros manages to write a dragon who is actually a character.
Feirge is direct and loyal. While she does engage in the odd bit of sarcasm and banter, she never does so at the expense of the moment. She relays Rhiannon’s orders efficiently and passed the response back to Rhiannon in the same manner. She is, in short, a perfect lieutenant.
How is it that Yarros can efficiently relay all of that in a handful of pages, yet Tairn and Andarna remain mere puppets for the self-insert Mary Sue power fantasy after three books?
Worldbuilding
Yarros manages to contradict herself pretty heavily in this chapter. I wouldn't say that anything here is a new plot hole. Rather, she aggravates existing issues.
Saddles
Throughout the chapter, there are multiple references to Rhiannon holding onto a “pommel”, as if she is using a saddle.
Originally, I was going to write a scathing critique of Yarros for trying to smuggle dragon saddles to the rest of the riders without admitting to the retcon. However, after digging through the novel, I realized that this was not the case. Everyone has indeed been bareback (save our Special Snowflake, of course) for this entire book, with the exception of them riding horses for one scene on Deverelli.
The explanation for what “pommel” actually means in this context comes from a line early in this chapter.
My grip tightens on the raised ridges of green scales that form the pommel.
Why did Yarros do this? It is needlessly confusing as a concept to introduce at the last minute, especially since it makes it seem like Rhiannon is riding a saddle.
What I suspect happened here is that Yarros was so used to writing from the perspective of a rider with a saddle that she ended up writing Rhiannon as if she had a saddle. Then, rather than edit out all the references to a “pommel”, she slapped in this line, the same way she slaps in so much aftshadowing. Alternatively, maybe she just couldn't be bothered to think of a more appropriate word and decided to stick with saddle terminology out of concenience.
Who Leads, Who Follows
Throughout this chapter, Rhiannon is undeniably in command. Feirge follows her orders and passes said orders on to the other dragons and gryphons. The closest Feirge has to input is when direct conflict with a wyvern in imminent. To claim that this puts Feirge in command is a bit like saying the Secret Service has the authority to use the nuclear football just because they get to drag the President out of a shooter’s line of fire.
On its own, this is perfectly fine. It’s consistent with everything we saw in the previous books and, indeed, every scene of Tairn in combat in this book. The issue is that this directly contradicts the validation speech that Xaden delivered to the self-insert Mary Sue in Chapter 40. It’s not even like Feirge is a chatbot who gives Rhiannon advice or translates her prompts into coherent orders. Everything that we are shown makes it clear that Rhiannon is the brains in control of this operation (or, at least, the portion of the operation that was delegated to her squad, with Violet being the mastermind).
Final Thoughts
This chapter is okay. The problem is that it’s filler in the middle of a climax that, just two chapters ago, was still going strong. If Yarros wanted to give us Rhiannon’s POV, then she should have committed and given Rhiannon a full subplot, of which this would merely be one action scene.
CHAPTER 63 - IMOGEN
Story
Imogen participates in aerial combat above Draithus. She then lands to help protect a tower that holds the city’s cache of venin-killing daggers. During this phase of the operation, Quinn is stabbed in front of her, and we are treated to an overwrought death scene that rushes Quinn’s backstory. With Garrick’s help, Imogen retreats to another part of the city, where we learn that the battle is going poorly and that only Violet can save them. The riders prepare a last-ditch effort to extend Aretia’s wards to Draithus by gathering up their venin-killing daggers.
Plot
The issue here is the same as with the Rhiannon chapter. This chapter could have been decent as part of a larger subplot built around Imogen. As it is, it comes out of nowhere, and nothing is resolved, so it’s just more filler.
The same applies to the action. We’re being asked to emotional invest in this situation because … this place we’ve never visited is important? Because Red Shirts are dying? This is all noise heaped upon noise.
As for the last-ditch effort to extend the Aretia wards to Draithus, I’m going to get into that more below, in the Chapter 65 analysis. For now, I’d just like to reiterate that, according to Yarros, the wards will only stop wyverns, not any of the venin. The riders also know that there are plenty of venin still around, as if there weren’t, then all the wyverns would have been neutralized. This means that the riders are sacrificing their only weapon to defeat the venin so that they can be killed by the venin directly instead of by the wyverns (at which point the venin would just destroy the alloy extending the wards and send the wyverns to kill all the refugees). This is ritual suicide, not a last chance for victory.
Characters
Imogen & Glane
Once more, Imogen is distinct from Violet and feels like a character who is a natural part of this world. Glane is an actual character, and she is distinct from Feirge. Unfortunately, that is the limit of the praise I can give. While I could tell you that Rhiannon is mission-oriented while still struggling with her own emotions while Feirge is direct and loyal, the only thing I can remember about Imogen and Glaine without actively staring at the text is that they gave me a different vibe. That basic quality of character voice was impressive the first time, but at the end of the day, it’s still basic.
Quinn
I’ve torn into Yarros already for both exploiting this character for virtue signaling and performing yet another Red Shirt sacrifice. The only thing I have to add is that this character’s death is meant to be the emotional core of the chapter, yet I could not care less about her.
Yarros knows she has not done enough for Quinn. That’s why she rams in Quinn’s whole backstory with Quinn in the death scene, complete with flashbacks. She is begging, on hands and knees, for us to weep at the death of this nothing of a character. Begging isn’t enough.
Worldbuilding
This chapter was invaluable for analyzing Garrick’s teleportation Signet, and it showed the flashy, narratively irrelevant inclusion of Imogen’s second Signet. Both were already discussed back in Chapter 12.
Final Thoughts
Again, as with Rhiannon’s chapter, this is pure filler. The narrative does not advance. No one grows. Yarrows could cut this chapter and lose nothing. If Yarros wanted to tell a story with Imogen as the POV, she should have committed and given her a subplot.
CHAPTER 65 - XADEN
Chapter 64 Context
At the end of Chapter 64, Violet witnessed Xaden unleashing his venin-enhanced Super Mega God Mode, with his shadows sweeping across the city and reaching her from wherever he was at the time. Chapter 65 backtracks a bit to explain why this happened.
Remember: when last we saw Xaden, he was going to defend Draithus. The only other context we have for him is that, according to Imogen’s chapter, he had vanished from the battle.
All right. Ready for Yarros to explain things?
Story
It was one thing to beckon me, call me, summon me to this hidden, sun-soaked canyon south of Draithus against my will, to drag me from the walls of our defenses and force me to walk away from my friends and a full of civilians. It is wholly another to have wounded and ensnared Sgaeyl.
Blood drips among her scales, coursing down her shoulder, and the sight of it soaking the forearm-thick ropes that bind her cuts me to the quick and floods me with power in a way nothing else could. I take it all, then draw more, but she’s already depleted from holding off so many wyvern at the walls of Draithus.
Oh … so it’s Iron Flame all over again.
Actually, worse. At least there, we knew Xaden was going to fight Berwyn. The location of their duel and the fact it was a duel were both nonsense, but at least we knew they were going to be fighting each other.
But I disgress …
We get the reveal that Berwyn is alive (despite this being acknowledged earlier with no reaction), that Panchek was the traitor inside Basgisth all along, and that some unspecified “brother” who knew Xaden was a venin is now also a venin. After Berwyn kills Panchek’s dragon, he tries to goad Xaden into channeling more by threatening Sgaeyl. Xaden gives in and unlocks Super Mega God Mode. He uses this to slay all the venin who aren’t tied to Berwyn and all the wyvern still attacking Draithus.
After this, Sgaeyl declares that Xaden is full committed to being a venin. He begs her help in covincing Tairn to let him near Violet so she can provide some unspecified aid. The chapter ends with Sgaeyl agreeing to assist in this endeavor.
Plot
Yarros gave up.
I’ll say the same about Violet’s chapters, but Chapter 65 is where all ambiguity went out the window.
The hard reset of the status quo to make this scene happen. The presentation of a nonsense twist that ultimately doesn’t change the narrative. Playing the pronoun game to set up a mystery box. It’s just layers upon layers of contrivance and drama, all to make the audience gasp is shock and theorize about what Book 4 may bring. She couldn’t be bothered to write an actual ending. Whether that’s because she ran out of ideas or just got bored and wanted to go back to Contemporary Romance, the result is the same: a utter mess splattered on the wall, followed by a quick exit.
And this isn’t even the true ending of the book. It gets much worse in Chapter 66.
The Panchek Twist
This twist is just stupid.
The idea that there is a traitor inside Navarre, leaking information to the venin (and, I suppose, passing on Theophanie’s mail) never added anything to this story to begin with. The only time when it might have affected an event in the narrative was the fall of Suniva, with the venin knowing exactly when the strike to destroy the larger-than-usual dagger stockpile, but as we have previously covered, betrayal was not actually needed for the venin to accomplish that. Said battle was in the background, rather than driving the story. This idea of a traitor was not building up to a twist. It was just a vibe, and not even a vibe that Yarros committed much effort to.
As for Panchek being the traitor … why? What motivated him to do this? Saying back in Fourth Wing that he wants political power does not equate to him becoming an energy vampire two books later. Why did he not turn venin prior to he climax of Iron Flame and destroy Basgiath’s wardstone himself? Why did he not aid Jack? He is the commandant. He has the power an authority to be a significant asset for bypassing security. So why did he never take advantage of his position to accomplish that goal, rather than waiting to betray everyine until after Navarre was already in open warfare against the venin?
Oh, and there’s the small matter of Yarros establishing, way back at the start of the book, that Xaden can sense venin. How did he not sense Panchek? If the answer is that Panchek was already too high-level of a venin to be detected, then he would have had to have been a venin before Xaden turned, meaning he was a venin well before Jack destroyed the wardstone in Iron Flame, so he should have been able to destroy true wardstone himself. The only other possible option is that he did not turn venin until this moment, begging the question of why he was working for the venin in the first place, seeing as how there is no precedent for the venin having non-venin servants.
Also …. remember when Yarros made a big deal about Xaden being an inntinnsic? How did he not see Panchek’s treachery coming? The answer Yarros gave in an interview for Xaden not knowing Jack was a venin - that people can using shielding - is not adequate. If anything, this confirms that the rider leadership could nullify the threat of inntinnsics by making shielding mandatory for officers past a certain rank, meaning that it should have been safe to weaponize inntinnsics rather than killing them. One cannot seal this plot hole of Xaden not recognizing Panchek was a traitor without reopening another one.
The Mystery Brother
I could speculate on who this mystery venin is … but that would be doing Yarros’s job for her.
Based on past precent with Yarros, on all the mystery boxes and retcons and outright lies, there is no point is trying to figure out who this is with the information available by the end of Onyx Storm. Yarros herself probably doesn’t know, and even if she does, she will likely flip on a dime in Book 4 and change the answer with zero regard for any plot holes this opens. The closest she comes to a plan is to tell us in Chapter 66 that Garrick is missing in the aftermath of the battle, but that’s worth about as much as her making a big deal out of the venin lure in the close of Fourth Wing. Even if she honestly intended this mystery venin to be Garrick at the time she wrote these chapters, odds are that she’ll just change the answer in Book 4 and then tear open plot holes as she tries to explain to the audience how brilliant she is.
As we covered back in August while discussing how Yarros uses bonus content, I strongly believe that the reason this is ultimately here is to support theorycrafting. It gives the audience something to chew on. It is meant to keep us hooked into the series with imagination and fandom, to let us spin our own fiction and to distract us while Yarros puts off writing Book 4.
Draithus
Right before the chapter ends, we get this line form Sgaeyl.
“They have completed the wards, but they extend no farther than Draithus.”
Ignore, for a moment, the glaring issue we covered in Chapter 63. Let’s pretend that setting up a ward extension really would save Draithus. If setting up the wards is this quick and easy, why was this not the first thing Aretia did once their wardstone was repaired?
Violet was catatonic for four days. Depending on how much time Chapter 55 covered, there may have been several more days on top of that. The trip Draithus is also only a few hours’ flight, and that assumes Garrick isn’t available to instantly teleport alloy and riders in.
They knew Draithus was in danger well in advance.
Apparently they were able to do this in minutes, using just the daggers carried on the riders’ persons, so it evidently doesn’t take much time or alloy.
Yarros is trying to assure us that all these characters she hasn’t given us good reason to care about are safe, but all I see are a faction of morons who risked the lives of thirty thousand people by not doing this the instant the Aretia wardstore was restored to its full power.
Character
Xaden
Xaden is an Edgelord and loves Violet. This is nothing new, and there is nothing deeper to it.
The Real Traitor
Panchek was the wrong choice to be the traitor. He’s a background character whom Yarros yanked out of a hat to avoid having to sacrifice one of her darlings.
Just to name a shortlist of better candidates:
Brennan
Devera
Markham
Jesinia
All there people have access to sensitive information. They also have some form if dynamic with Violet. Not only are they all qualified to be traitors, but the dynamic lends some emotion weight that would make the twist mean something. With Markham, we’re conditioned to see him an an antagonist, so his transition would feel as appropriate as Jack's. As for everyone else, it wouldn’t be the first time Yarros grabbed a character she previously insisted we should like and transformed that person into a villainous caricature.
Worldbuilding
Bloodlines
This chapter gives us explicit confirmation that venin do work on some sort of vampire bloodlines system. This was vaguely hinted at previously by way of Theophanie referring to Jack as Xaden’s “brother”. Now, we’re being told Xaden cannot harm Berwyn and indicating that Berwyn can compel Xaden to come to him, which is something right out of a stories where a vampire’s “sire” has control over that vampire.
How and why does this work? Vampire bloodlines aren't just called that because it sounds catchy and references the thing vampires drink. The whole reason that the sire is even called a sire is because this sire is directly responsible for creating the next generation of vampires (i.e. is the father or mother responsible for bringing a new vampire into the world). This establishes a direct connection between the magical nature of any given vampire and the magic of the sire.
That doesn’t apply here. We were Shown how Xaden acquired his powers. Berwyn did not provide him with power or even instruct him. At the absolute most, he engineered a scenario where Xaden became a venin entirely as a result of his own abilities. There shouldn’t be a connection between Xaden’s power and Berwyn’s. Why, then, would Xaden now be bound to obey / be unable to harm Berwyn?
I think Yarros made this up because she wrote herself into a corner. She made Xaden so absurdly powerful that even she understands that he invalidiates all conflict. Now she needs to put Xaden on a leash to keep him from ending the series single-handedly.
Death Wave Channel
In this chapter, Berwyn drains Panchek’s dragon instantaneous by stabbing it with a dagger. Xaden is shocked by this. It’s framed within the scene as some devastating new weapon.
I mention this here purely because I assume Yarros is trying to create another mystery box. Outside of that … why is this a shock? As early as Fourth Wing, we saw how a death wave attack can instantly kill a dragon. This is the same thing, just conducted through a dagger for … precision? Efficiency? My point being, this doesn’t actually change anything. It really seems like business as usual.
Overall Thoughts
The one redeeming factor of this chapter is that, unlike the other two analyzed here, it makes sense to have a single chapter in Xaden’s POV at the end of the story. There is an established precedent for it. If we consider Chapter 66 of this book to be an epilogue rather than a numbered chapter, then it even continues the pattern of having Xaden’s POV be the final chapter.
Other than that, this is just a mess. Yarros is rushing as many elements as possible to just get this book over with.
ANALYSIS OF ALTERNATIVE POVS
Up front, I will say that I don’t think Yarros was outright lying when she explained her reason for these POVs. Yes, her response to the question about the alternative POVs sounds like something to made up after the fact to pretend she’s a more thoughtful writer than she actually is. Yes, the vagueness of her response to the follow-up about more POVs in the future tells me that she really has no plan and is trying to avoid being caught out. That being said, the more I think about her explanations, the more it seems like this is another case of Yarros not understanding what the meanings of things she’s saying. Her answers make sense. They just don’t line up with the broader handling of these characters.
Rhiannon
I fought for that really hard in my draft to keep it because I figured that one of the lessons Violet is learning is that she cannot be all things to all people. And I do find that sometimes heroines get overpowered where they are the only one who may accomplish this. And that’s not how it works in a military unit. You have to delegate. And her mission is to go over here and take out this one objective which leaves all of this major battle happening without Violet present. And I kind of think cinematically, as I’m writing, I would want to know what’s happening back there. And the most logical choice is really that Violet believes that Rhi is the best of them, and to go back into Rhi’s head and see how Rhi is also, while outwardly very confident, struggling with, “Are these the right decisions? Is this leadership? Is this what I should be doing?” And seeing her evolve through that scene and her relationship with Feirge.
This response flabbergasted me. It’s a good answer - for a completely different book series. In regards to this series, it’s just fundamentally disconnected from everything Yarros has put into both Rhiannon’s chapter and the three books thus far.
Yes, Ms. Yarros - there is a danger of making your self-insert Mary Sue too powerful. You have blown past that point. A new POV chapter fixes nothing.
Yes, Ms. Yarros - militaries work the way they do for a reason. You can’t ignore that fact for three books and then expect it to justify a filler chapter.
No, Ms. Yarros. Rhiannon did not “evolve through that scene.”
The only part of this response that is not dissociative word salad is that Yarros “wanted to know what’s happening back there.” She disrupted the flow of her climax because she got bored and decided to wander off to check another POV. At best, this is an admission that her climax had jumped the rails and that she was flailing for ways to make it interesting again without having to do major rewrites.
What frustrates me most about this is that Yarros is moving goalposts to avoid finding fault in Violet. There was no journey where Violet learned this lesson. She did not fail because of it. What this ultimately amounts to is Yarros saying, “Woe is me, my self-insert Mary Sue carries the weight of the world on her shoulders,” for most of the book, only to turn around here and say, “Aren’t I mature for acknowledging that others pull their weight?”
The only opportunity Yarros gave to show Violet learning to put trust in Rhiannon was with Sawyer’s disability. She instead hijacked that to make it all about Violet contributing and helping Rhiannon to fix a problem that Rhiannon had failed to solve on her own while Violet was on the rainbow dragon hunt.
If Yarros really wanted to explore these ideas for both Violet and Rhiannon, then she needed to give Rhiannon a whole subplot about growing into leadership. She should have carved out the filler at the beginning and replaced it with chapters of Rhiannon struggling with Sawyer and with her duties while Violet was away on the rainbow dragon hunt. She should also have given more focus to the dynamic of trust between Violet and Rhiannon, perhaps with Violet’s general attitude of rebeling to take charge of situations causing the two to butt heads early on. That way, when Violet declares her faith in Rhiannon at the end of Chapter 60 and we see Rhiannon taking charge in Chapter 61, if would be an actual payoff.
Imogen
And then going into Imogen’s head, I knew that Imogen was where I wanted to be, because she knows things that other people don’t. She’s a marked one. And she’s one of my favorite characters, she has been since Book 1. And that evolution of where she first steps onto that mat with Violet in Book 1, versus where she’s standing with Violet at the end of Book 3, is one of my favorite arcs, and I knew that needed to come from her. Plus, there’s a moment where she gives up her dagger because we need more power to power these wards. And to me, it’s very symbolic of what the marked ones have done, which is continuously give away this power to try and shield others and defend others. And for it to be Imogen that does it was symbolic to me.
No, Ms. Yarros. Imogen has not had an “arc”. She went from wanting to kill Violet before Threshing in Fourth Wing to helping once Violet was bonded to Xaden, and things fizzled from there. You may have given her more time to develop a relationship with Violet than you gave to Rhiannon, but this is still a very bland character who exists to orbit around Violet.
If Imogen is truly “one of [Yarros’s] favorite characters”, then I must ask again: why not give her a subplot? Yarros could Show us her struggles. We could have learned about her bond with Quinn, experienced her shifting perspective about Violet, and dealt with her struggles as a child of a rebel officer. This might actually have been a good way to repurpose the animosity between the Navarrian and Aretia riders. Yarros could have given us a subplot of Imogen dealing with a flare-up of animosity against the rebel children as people realize the Basgisth wardstone only got destroyed in the first place because the rebel children disrupted Melgren’s visions. It could have been something for Imogen to deal while Violet was away on the rainbow dragon hunt.
Instead … she was just used to try to force investment in a climax that had already jumped the rails.
CONCLUSION
All three of these alternative POV chapters are compelling evidence that Yarros is in over her head and is in no way prepared to finish this series.
None of these alternative POVs are inherently bad. They could have worked if given their own subplots. For them to be rammed into the climax like this, with two purely being filler and the last being used to retcon nonsense into the ending of the book, tells me that Yarros is grasping at straws while also being too lazy to just pop the lid off the cup and drink directly from the rim.
At this point, I am genuinely concerned that Book 4 will be outright illegible. Is Yarros going to start ramming filler chapters from random characters into that narrative whenever she gets bored? Will the retcons make The Queen of Vorn seem like a cohesive narrative by comparison?
What Yarros should have done here was make all three chapters about Xaden. She could have explored him abandoning his post and shown us the fall of his new “brother”. If the Panchek twist were essential, she could even have set the reveal up and shown us Xaden discovering the answer. All of this would make Xaden unleashing Super Mega God Mode far more satisfying.
I wish I could say that this is the worst the climax has to offer, but … no. It does indeed get worse.
THE CRATER
Tomorrow, we will bear witness to the mount this book finally hits the floor and tunnels into it.
Yarros gave up. I know I keep saying it, but I cannot stress that fact enough. What happens in Chapters 62, 64, and 66 makes the endings if the previous two books seem coherent by comparison. We started with the best climax and are ending with the worst ending.
Assume the crash positions, everyone. Please remember to subscribe to the newsletter if you’d like weekly updates with the latest posts. Please also share this review with others if you enjoyed it. Take care, and I hope to see you all tomorrow.