Quest of the Wolf (Magnetic Magic, Book 4)
Hello, all. Welcome back to the review of Magnetic Magic.
As promised back in September, I am rettiend to this series for its latter half. I was originally going to do them all in this month, but with the adjustment of the schedule, we'll instead to doing one book per month from now through February. We’ll then do the series retrospective on Sundays in February and March.
Please feel free to revisit the review for the previous three books if you need a refresher. Otherwise, let’s dive right in.
STATS
Title: Quest of the Wolf
Series: Magnetic Magic (Book 4)
Author(s): Lindsay Buroker
Genre: Fantasy (Urban)
First Printing: May 2025
Publisher: Self-published to Amazon
SPOILER WARNING
Mild, unmarked spoilers for the entirety of Quest of the Wolf will be provided throughout this review. The first paragraph of any given section will be kept spoiler-free. Any heavy spoilers for this book will be confined to clearly labelled sections.
Heavy spoilers from the previous books of the Magnetic Magic series will appear in this review. These will not be marked. I’m also going to assume that you have already read my reviews for these books, though it’s not necessary to understand this review.
TERMINOLOGY
The names of all these books are rather similar, so we’ll be abbreviating them as follows.
Way of the Wolf (Book 1) = Way
Relics of the Wolf (Book 2) = Relics
Kin of the Wolf (Book 3) = Kin
Quest of the Wolf (Book 4) = Quest
Curse of the Wolf (Book 5) = Curse
Triumph of the Wolf (Book 6) = Triumph
Also, I will be referring to the werewolves in this setting who are capable of assuming a half-human, half-wolf form as “hybrids”. Those of you who have read the past reviews know why.
STRUCTURE
We’ll be covering most of the same points as the previous two books.
Premise
Rating
Series
Content Warning
Plot
Character
Worldbuilding
Prose / Editing
I will not be analyzing the Romance separately this time. Because of Duncan’s situation in this book, the Romance between him and Luna doesn’t move forward. While there are certainly elements that we’ve previously touched upon while discussing the Romance, we can easily fold those elements into the discussion of the Content Warning and Characters.
PREMISE
Once more, we’re going straight from the Amazon product page.
Luna is worried about Duncan, the new roguishly charming werewolf in her life. He’s gone missing, and she’s sure their enemies are behind it.
She’s determined to find and rescue Duncan, but her attention is split because her son is home for the holidays. Before long, her enemies are after him too. Why is all the trouble in her life spilling over onto those she cares about?
To fix her problems and help her loved ones, Luna will need all the power, potions, and chocolate (especially chocolate) that she can scrounge up. But against foes who know werewolves well, even that may not be enough.
Reaction
This premise is off-base, and I think a lot of the problems in this book stem from that fact. You see, while the elements of this premise comprise the A Plot of this book, the premise neglects to mention the B Plot.
A disproportionate amount of focus in this book is put on the local crime problem in Luna’s area, something hinted at in Way and brought properly into focus in Kin. Half of the action scenes, along with somewhere between a third and a half of the overall story, stem from this B Plot.
If this book were substantially longer than its predecessors, this wouldn’t be a problem. However, Quest is roughly the same length as both Relics and Kin while being less than 15% longer than Way. As a result, we get two plots, either one of which could be a book on its own, competing for space.
RATING: 5/10
Consequently, this book is the worst of the series thus far.
It’s not terrible. The story isn’t completely broken. The problem is that Buroker tries to juggle way too much, and as a result, this plot-driven narrative ends up feels very unsatifying. So much time is wasted on the B Plot, which doesn’t get a resolution (or even reach anything resembling a milestone). At the same time, the main plot we were promised has to rush or handwave multiple elements to make up for the time lost.
Were Quest a stand-alone, I would rate it at a 4/10. I’m giving it a little grace because of the way it functions within the series as a whole. We’re not seeing the totality of the story, just a single episode, and said episode doesn’t damage the previous books (at least, not in a way that they weren’t already damaged). The series carries on, and because that overall story is intact, it uplifts the book.
What’s lost, in the end, is the emotional gravity that this story should have had. That’s a real shame, given how the previous two entries were satisfying as standalone adventures.
SERIES
This book seems to be focused less on telling its own story and more on setting up for the final two entries in the series. While I do appreciate what Buroker is trying to set up, trying to do all of it in this one book is very messy.
Duncan and the Control Device
The plot promised to us in the Premise follows through on the consequences from Kin. Duncan exited that story in the thrall of Radomir and Lord Abrams, answering the call of the control device that was introduced in Relics. Luna spends the book trying first to track him down and then trying to free him from the control device.
I’ll get into the execution of this more in Plot, but for now, I just want to pose some speculation. I think that Buroker made up the control device to facilitate the climax of Relics, with Duncan chasing Luna in hybrid form, and then felt that the device tied her hands narratively. She was able to tiptoe around the issue in Kin and even take full advantage of it by establishing as a threat that would become relevant again as soon as Duncan entered hybrid form. However, once she made good on that threat, she put herself into a corner. So long as she keeps Radomir and/or Lord Abrams around as antagonists, they could, at any moment, enslave Duncan again. This necessitated both the destruction of the control device and extra insurance to make it clear to the audience that Duncan cannot be controlled again. (More on that extra insurance when we discuss spoilers in Plot.)
Crime Wave
Despite it not being part of the core plot of the book, the criminal elements terrorizing Luna’s town get more scenes and pages than they did in the previous three books put together. At first, it seems like Buroker is testing Luna by putting her into a scenario where she needs to defend herself without Duncan around (since he was around the previous two times she encountered local thugs). The issue is that this doesn’t come to a true resolution. There’s a fight scene two-thirds of the way into the book, just before Luna and her allies depart for their mission to reclaim the control device, and then that’s it. We’re explicitly told in the book’s epilogue that the issue isn’t resolved.
I suspect that this is all setup for Book 5 or 6. The ending of Quest seems to imply that Duncan wants to use his newfound liberation to help Luna deal with the crime problem. I don’t think that the scenes in this book are necessarily bad if that’s the goal. I just wish they didn’t take up page space that could have been devoted to better fleshing out the various efforts to save Duncan.
CONTENT WARNING
Nudity
The way nudity is handled in this book makes it feel like Buroker is going out of her way to make it taboo and sexual. Luna and Duncan have at least one extended exchange of banter about each other’s bodies. Emphasis is put on the complications of Duncan walking around the apartment complex naked before he does so with zero consequences. There is even a scene where Luna is caught by a tenant as she walks back to her apartment naked after a transformation.
Still, at least Buroker is handling the clothing-destruction rule consistently. In one of the fight scenes, Luna has to go out of her way to find a safe place to change clothes so that she doesn’t lose her cell phone.
Sexuality
Due to the Duncan's situation in this book, he and Luna don't really have an opportunity to discuss sexual matters outside of the nudity banter. However, focus is still put on Luna being fertile and potentially having “offspring” with him.
Violence / Peril
We get three actions scenes of Luna fighting as a werewolf, plus one car chase scene. As hinted in the Premise, Luna’s college-aged son is also put in danger.
I mention this item mainly for completeness. Buroker is good about making these scenes feel exciting and dangerous without heaping on the gore.
PLOT
Duncan and the Control Device
As stated in the premise, the A Plot of this book follows Luna’s efforts to save Duncan, first by finding where Radomir and Lord Abrams are keeping him and then by trying to get her hands on the control device.
I really feel that this should have been the only plot in this book. Quest is at its best when Luna, aided by her intern Bolin and her niece Jasmine, is searching and scheming. The problems with this plot could be fairly easily solved by just giving it more time in focus to flesh out specific elements.
Agency Confusion
A good example of this need for more focus is how much the control device actually influences Duncan - specifically, how much it influences him when he’s not in hybrid form.
In the last book, Duncan was able to perceive the call of the control device but ultimately ignore it so long as he wasn't a hybrid. In this book, Luna expects to find Duncan shackled up somewhere in hybrid form … only to discover that he is not only free but also able to return to human form. He’s now working with Radomir and Lord Abrams. He’s not even doing it as part of some deal to protect Luna (though he does try to pull this retroactively in a failed attempt to defuse the second action scene). He’s helped them find werewolf relics because … he's a treasure hunter and likes looking for magical relics. And yet, at the same time, Luna can see this scar he has on his head is glowing, which is also the visual cue for when he’s under their control in hybrid form.
So … where does Duncan’s agency begin and end?
This sort of dilemma could have been great for fleshing out characters and exploring Luna and Duncan's relationship through interpersonal conflict. Buroker toys with this a bit, and it’s some of the best character work in the book. What she did simply wasn't enough. We don’t understand what Duncan can or can't do at this point, which makes it very hard to understand where the story might go or how we’re supposed to feel about any of it. The situation isn't dissimilar to what Paolini jammed Murtaugh into Murtaugh. We needed more time to explore this problem and understand Duncan’s agency, especially given how this plot ends.
Control Device and Werewolf Relics (Heavy Spoilers)
Just as in Relics and Kin, Luna comes up with a clever plan to get hold of the control device. Also like those books, the plan blows up in her face, but that just gives us a chance to enjoy the tension as she tries to make the more of the situation.
Prior to the third action scene (the second with the criminal gang), Duncan comes to visit Luna in human form. Luna realizes that he’ll be compelled to return to Radomir and Lord Abrams the next time he goes into hybrid form. She decides to attach a GPS tracker to him (more specifically, to a talisman that he found for her back in Way, which she then puts around his neck) and just follow him back to their hideout.
This goes well … except, for some reason, Duncan does not immediately run back to them when he next adopts hybrid form. He first breaks into his van and steals a case containing what is later revealed to be his SCUBA gear (something he uses for treasure hunting).
You see, it was touched upon a few times in this book (and, I’m pretty sure, also established in the previous books) that Luna’s pack is missing a special amulet. They have its twin (introduced all the way back in Way), which is intended for the alpha female of the pack, but the male amulet disappeared generations ago. Radomir and Lord Abrams are using Duncan to track it down, and he’s already concluded that the amulet is probably at the bottom of a lake (since, prior to modern diving equipment, hiding things by dropping them into deep lakes would have been very effective). When summoned this time, gets a vision from the taliman that Luna attached the tracking device to, which confirms which lack the male amulet is in. Duncan has just enough agency to reason that he can retrieve the male amulet on the way to answering his summons.
All this is explained to us in the Epilogue, after the following happens in the climax.
Duncan arrives late to the final action scene. When he does, Radomir (who is also here, due to his involvement in events we’ll cover down below) tried to use the control device on him again. The male amulet protects Duncan, allowing him to attack Radomir. Radomir drops the control device as he escapes.
This is not a terrible twist. It could have worked if it got enough focus, such as time to actually Show us Duncan recovering the male amulet. As it is, it reads like Buroker aftshadowed a Deus ex Machina to resolve her A Plot.
The Crime Wave
I don’t hate the B Plot of this book. I hate that it competes for space (and effectively displaces) the A Plot.
The Criminals (Heavy Spoilers)
For most of the book, the unnamed group of criminals (an archetypal biker gang) is trying to intimidate Luna. This is the same group from both the first action scene at the apartment complex in Way abd convenience store robbery scene in Kin. They somehow identified Luna after the convince store incident (because of their brush with her in Way? Seems like a stretch, as none of them seemed to recognize her in Kin) and are now showing up on her door to intimidate her.
Setting aside the question of how they identified her, the first action scenes makes sense. They show up to threaten Luna, her werewolf instincts kick in, and pandemonium ensues.
What’s stranger is what happens next. The gang’s leader calls Luna to threaten her … and then, minutes later, with cops on the property, the gang breaks into and trashes her apartment. Later that same night, then then come back to attack the complex. It feels like Buroker didn’t have an actual plan for this group and just treated them as a button she pushed repeatedly to inject tension into a slower section of the story.
What’s really baffling, though, is that gang has magic items in the second action scene. How did they come by these? Nothing remotely paranormal was established about this group previously.
The magic items also makes the criminals feel less like a faction and more like a stand-in. These scenes could have featured Radomir’s men as the antagonists assailing the apartment context to captur Luna and/or steal back the relics she recovered from them. It could have featured August’s band of criminal werewolves comes by to settle the score with Luna (especially since Kin established they have no qualms about using magic items for an unfair advantage over other werewolves). Using the criminals for these fights and giving them faction makes it feel like Buroker is just trying to avoid using the factions that would make a lot more sense in these fights.
Ultimately, none of this is resolved. The criminals remain a threat at the end of the book. That might be fine if they had their own identity, but at this point, it feels like they are just filling narrative space that belongs to someone else.
The Fuzz (Heavy Spoilers)
Due to the crime wave, a pair of cops start frequenting the complex. I’m only going to mention the name of one, Officer Dubois, since the other doesn’t have enough character to warrant a name. Both of these cops actually appeared back in Relics, when they answered the 911 calls of residents after Radomir’s men attempted to abduct Luna.
In Quest, these two begin actively investigating the reports of wolf attacks at the apartment, accusing one of Luna’s tenant (the alchemist character who moved in at the end of the last book) of training wolves and keeping them as pets (because someone sees her pet Luna in wolf form after the first action scene of this book).
This is a very frustrating subplot. Buroker dangles the idea that Luna’s identity will eh exposed and that her life will fall apart. However, with the way things are framed on the page, it’s hard to take this seriously. It really seems like the police should either not have enough information to accuse anyone of anything or else have already figured out that Luna is a werewolf. The fact they are investigating but can’t connect the dots feels like Luna is only being spared via stupidity.
The end of the book doesn’t help matters. During the second action scene, the police are in the property when the criminal gang attacks, and Dubois’s partner is killed. She figures out in this fight that Luna is a werewolf … based on her eyes.
Dubois met my gaze. Here it came…
“I believe you saved my life,” she said.
I didn’t answer, expecting her to say that it didn’t matter. She knew I’d been responsible for the deaths weeks before. She knew what I was and would arrest me.
After a few silent moments, Dubois raised her eyebrows. “That was you, wasn’t it? There were two, ah, wolves, but the black one… had your eyes.”
“Huh.” I didn’t see a recording device, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t have one active in her pocket. My gut told me not to admit anything.
This is contrived, but it would be somewhat forgiveable if there were consequences … only there are no consequences. We learn right after this epilogue that Dubois is leaving Luna and Duncan be for now. That means the police interest in this book goes absolutely nowhere.
Luna’s Son
I need to play a bit of catch-up for this one, as it leans on background that existed in the previous books but has not been relevant to the past reviews.
Luna has a human ex-husband, Chad, and two human children, Austin and Cameron. Her husband knew she was a werewolf (and seemed to have a fetish about that fact), while her sons did not. Austin is the son relevant to this book.
Luna is understandably worried about this visit by her son. Aside from all the general drama and danger in her life at the moment, this is the first time she has been around either of her children while not taking the werewolf suppression potion.
Out of Harm’s Way
Almost as soon as the story starts, Austin requests Luna’s permission to spend the holidays snowboarding with his friends rather than staying at the complex with her. She reluctantly agrees, but accepts that is the best way to keep him out of danger. From that point on, Austin mainly interacts with Luna in the form of phone calls.
I think this is a serviceable way to streamline the story. Yes, the premise promised that Austin would play a large role in this story, but with everything else going on in this story, juggling the added drama of Austin figuring out that his mother is a werewolf (and it would be hard for him not to figure it out, given how Luna is repeatedly forced to transform at the complex), would require time and focus that Buroker doesn’t have in a book this small.
… Of course, this is also what makes the ending of this book rather frustrating.
“Her enemies are after him, too” (Heavy Spoilers)
As indicated by the Premise, Austin plays a role in the finale, and that role both opens plot holes and bungles a payoff.
A small, seemingly innocuous detail about Austin going on this snowboarding trip with his friends is that one of his buddies won the trip (or, at least, won the AirBnB they’d be staying at) in some unspecified contest. As it turns out, this particular property is owned by Radomir. The “contest” was a trap to allow him to take Austin hostage and thus extort Luna into returning the werewolf relics that she snatched back from him in the climax of Relics.
This is such a needlessly complicated plan.
Radomir knows where Luna lives. Back in Relics, he sent gunmen to the apartment complex when Luna tried to bait him with a fake werewolf relic. The only reasons that this went poorly for his men are that Duncan was there, which is something Radomir did not expect.
So … why not just send a larger number of men to the complex to grab Austin? If he knows about about Austin to not only know he’s in town but also arrange this trap by targeting Austin’s friend, why not send men to seize Austin while he was in transit to return to Luna? In fact, now that he has Duncan under his thumb, why not send Duncan (in hybrid form) to grab Austin, or just skip Austin entirely and just send Duncan to loot any werewolf relics at the apartment complex)?
It feels like this scenario was contrived purely so that Buroker could remove Austin from the bulk of the book while still keeping her promises from the Premise. It just doesn’t make sense. Worse, it makes Radomir seem to incompetent to be a serious threat. At least in Kin, it was implied that Radomir wasn’t coming after Luna because he had other interests and just couldn’t be bothered. Now, I wonder how dangerous he really can be when he has all these resources and all these men under his command but can’t simply overwhelm Luna.
Now, maybe this could have had a payoff in the form of character drama. After all, behind taken hostage because of his mother’s werewolf life is a (narratively) fantastic way for Austin to learn the truth about her. However, we don’t get that payoff.
In the course of the hostage crisis and the eventual rescue, Austin finds out that his mother is a werewolf … somehow. It’s not clear how. She transforms outside of the house where he’s being held hostage, inside Duncan’s van (allowing her a few moments of safety to strip off her clothes), and it’s not clear that Austin was even in a position to see her go into the van and her wolf form coming out. We then get dialogue during the action scene where Austin seems to realize what’s going on - without it actually being clear if he understands the wolves in this battle are werewolves (at least, until Duncan shows up in hybrid form). After, we get a passage in the Epilogue that Tells us that Austin now knows everything.
Soon after the battle, I’d changed back and spoken to my son. He hadn’t said much, mostly that he planned to return to Shoreline with his friends in the morning. I’d been tempted to grab his ear, throw him in the van, and say he would ride back with his mother. Now.
But his eyes had been haunted, and I had the feeling he wanted some time before dealing with what he’d seen—with deciding if his brain would accept what his eyes had witnessed. And maybe I needed a night’s sleep too before having to face questions I didn’t know if I was ready to answer. For now, he was safe. Tomorrow would be soon enough to deal with the rest.
So … did Luna tell Ausitn the truth? Did one of Radomir’s men let something slip? Does he secretly have werewolf powers or magical sensitivity that he’s been hiding from Luna? I don’t know, because Buroker didn’t provide that information us. We don't even get the emotional fallout of this revelation. We’re just Told that Austin is processing things.
Maybe this will be paid off in Curse. For now, it’s a massive letdown. A payoff was at least hinted at, only to not be delivered. To borrow from the review of The Queen of Vorn, the status quo regarding what Austin knows has simply been reset.
Final Thoughts
The issues with the plot of Quest leave me feeling like these books are out of order.
Duncan starts out Quest in the same place he would have been in at the start of Book 3, had Buroker not hit the undo button on the climax of Relic.
The clashes between Luna and the criminal gang fills in encounters where she might otherwise feud with either Augustus and his followers or Radomir’s men, both factions that would be emboldened by Duncan being out of the picture.
The criminal gang is picking up a plot thread that was initally an issue because of Augustus.
If one removes Austin from the picture, then one could very easily swap the order of Quest and Kin. The thugs could be, if not outright replaced by Augustus and his followers, then at least supplied with magical weapons by them in order to harass Luna without exposing their sinister behavior to the pack. Doing this would remove the question of why Radomir and Lord Abrams let Duncan go in Relics if they just planned to bring him back anyway. What’s more, because Buroker would be continuing the threat posed by Augustus, rather than establishing a new faction, she could cut back on the involvement of the thugs and use the extra pages to explore Duncan’s agency and the elements needs for the climax of this book to work.
I’m not saying that this had to be the order the books were put in, but it would at least streamline the story.
CHARACTER
This series has been doing pretty well for itself as a plot-driven instead of a character-driven series, yet this book sorely needed to at least slow down enough for a little character work.
As mentioned above, the issue of Duncan’s agency sorely needed to be explored and developed. Not doing so muddled the stakes.
Removing Austin from the narrative for the majority of the book robbed the audience of the chance to get to know Luna better through their dynamic, not to mention the narrative opportunities of exploring the impact of her paranormal life on that dynamic. Maybe Buroker plans to do this in Curse, yet not doing so now is still a waste.
Outside of this, there’s not much to comment on in terms of characters. Luna, , Jasmine, and Bolin are consistently portrayed, and the secondary characters are forgettable. Buroker seems to be going for a Pair the Spares thing with Bolin and Jasmine that feels more obligatory than engaging.
All that said, there is one bright spot in terms of character work: Duncan.
Amidst the fog of uncertainty about Duncan’s agency, there’s a moment where he shows how much he genuinely cares for Luna. After parting ways before the second action scene, Duncan makes his way to the apartment complex to see Luna. He realizes that his decision (compelled or otherwise) to work with Radomir and Lord Abrams let her down. He openly tells her that he understands that he upsets her and wants to make things up to her. It’s a small touch, yet it’s one that not only gives Duncan greater depth but also shows that there is indeed more to this romance than sex and banter.
We also get an interesting reaction from Duncan whenever the suggestion of him having children with Luna comes up. Every time this is mentioned, he gets closed-off and angry. Buroker doesn’t tell us why, and I hope she properly explores it in Curse or Triumph (especially if she keeps shoving this idea into focus). For now, she’s given us enough about Duncan’s background that it’s not hard to gauge what might be going through his head. Duncan is a clone, created to be someone’s tool. In Kin, he expressed mixed feelings about the second, child clone from the same template who was revealed back in Relics. It’s possible that Duncan feels some combination of:
Apprehension at having children who might inherit his hybrid powers and thus be vulnerable to exploitation themselves.
Anger at the expectation for him to have children, as this is somewhat similar to Lord Abrams expecting him bite people and produce new werewolves.
Fear that he lacks the experience and upbringing to make for a good father himself.
I wish Quest had given us more of exploring Duncan’s character. These moments were easily the best in the book.
WORLDBUILDING
I honestly can’t think of anything new that was established in this book. Buroker is cruising along, playing by the rules she previously established.
PROSE / EDITING
Subtlety
I’m swinging back to my original position from Way: I think the lack of subtlety in this series is due to editing errors.
The reason I conclude this comes down to a small yet rather noticeable moment about halfway through the book. Buroker continues an idea from Kin, with Luna reflecting on a suggestion Duncan made that she dress up in a cape and fight crime in her neighborhood as a superhero. The fact that this idea comes up again makes sense in the moment. However, there’s a moment where isn’t brought up in Chapter 15 … and then repeated in Chapter 16, a mere eight pages later, both times in narrative (i.e. not prompted as part of dialogue) and using similar wording Either one of these might have been fine, but by having both, Buroker makes it seem like she forgot that she’d put one of these instances in and slapped in the other practically on top of it.
This is a very small moment that wouldn’t be worth mentioning in isolation. It’s just, given the overall bluntness of the text, it is starting to seem like Buroker isn’t taking enough time for edits and proofreading.
Banter
With Duncan absent for a large chunk of the story, the increase in banter between Luna and characters other than him is a lot more noticeable.
The banter is an aspect of this series that I haven’t ever enjoyed. The thing was, back in Way, I assumed it was something specific to characterization. It was most noticeable through Luna’s dynamic with Duncan, so it was something that could be tagged on the interaction of these specific individuals. I supposed, in hindsight, that there was also some of this between Luna and Bolin, but it read very differently. Instead of a stream of flirting, innuendo, and forced charm, it felt more like Bolin was the Straight Man whom Luna was lightly ribbing in order to make their forced proximity more bearable.
In Quest, Luna’s banter with Bolin feels the same as her banter with Duncan, and she’s also bantering with Jasmine. The only difference is that her banter with these two side characters doesn’t have the sexual elements that she tosses around with Duncan.
To an extent, I think changing the nature of the banter could work. Bolin is learning to relax about Luna, and her increased ties with Jasmine show how she’s reconnecting with family after her long absence. Some level of consistency at the core of the banter is also to be expected. Luna is the common element in all these discussions. We’re meant to associate the banter with her dry wit.
What we got in Quest is just a step too far. The banter no longer reads like a reflection of the characters. It instead reads like Whedonism.
False Cliffhangers
There are a couple of false cliffhangers in this book, with Buroker terminating a scene at an arbitrary point. The two most obvious ones were:
Chapter 15 to 16
Chapter 21 to 22
In fairness to Buroker, either one of these cliffhangers could have worked. Both do come at a moment when something changes the scene to some degree, with Chapter 15 ending on Luna sensing someone approaching her apartment and Chapter 21 ending on Luna being confronted by Duncan in hybrid form. The issue in both cases is delivery.
Buroker continues a few paragraphs past to optimal break point, actually winding things down a bit after the initial change before ending the chapter on a line that only sounds dramatic on a first read.
She doesn’t pay off the chance in the following paragraph. What’s set up by that seemingly dramatic line just fizzles out.
THE QUEST CONCLUDES
For all of its flaws, Quest of the Wolf is a weak middle entry in a series that is still decent overall. Buroker can absolutely take the new status quo at the end of this book and write two satisfying final entries to close out this series. I’ll willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and see where she takes things in Curse of the Wolf.
HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
Originally, I was going to knock out all the novels in the back half of Magnetic Magic across December, but as we covered back in the schedule announcement for Winter 2026, I’ve had to reshuffle my schedule. We’ll still be finishing this series soon. It will just be spread out a bit more.
On January 9th, we will review Book 5, Curse of the Wolf.
On February 6th, we will review Book 6, Triumph of the Wolf.
The retrospective series for Magnetic Magic as a whole will be spread across Sundays in February and March.
In the interim, we’ve now entered the home stretch of Onyx Storm. The ten chapters that comprise the climax and the falling action are bizarre. Yarros actually manages a strong start. This is the first book in The Empyrean where I felt genuinely invested in the events of the climax. Then things get … weird. The quality nosedives. Yarros starts ramming in POV chapters for Rhiannon and Imogen, two characters who previously have not gotten POVs, before doing a Xaden POV that is nonsensical due to lack of setup. She then ends the book on a note that feels like she just gave up and just tossed out a bunch of mystery boxes for the audience to ponder while she tries to figure out what she’s supposed to do with Book 4.
To analyze this, we’re going to do a mini-series within the series, with each part releasing on subsequent days.
Climax, Part 1 - Chapters 57 through 60 will release on December 19th
Climax, Part 2 - Chapters 61, 63 & 65 will release on December 20th
Climax, Part 3 - Chapters 62, 64, & 66 will release on December 21st
Buckle into your Special Snowflake dragon saddles. This is going to get as chaotic as the aerial combat scene from Chapter 10.
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