Previous book here.
This is the final book in this trilogy. It's both good and yet kinda...I feel like it wraps up a bit fast? Anyway, the second book ended on a happy note, but the third book goes right on back to PATRIARCHY WINS and patriarchy outnumbering the good people, and Ama and Luca being frustrated as heck that they can't just easily get married, join their kingdoms, and have a feminist utopia. There's a line in the book, "Rights meant nothing to a woman if men said they did not," and that's still pretty irritatingly true and a lot of what Ama and Luca are fighting in the book, along with "how does Luca deal with a new kingdom" and one of their enemies ah, returning. But how do you fight a billion years of patriarchy?
SEMI-SPOILERISH DISCUSSION BEYOND THIS POINT. I'm not going to totally spoiler space it, but I find it hard to write a review without making more semi-detailed commentary.
The title character...well, I won't spoil the ending of book 2, but we'll say someone returns unexpectedly, but I don't know if I felt super menaced by that particular threat or not? Said character is pretty well preoccupied with survival for the most part, though some damage is done here and there. This series seems to have originated with the concept of "The Princess Bride" and while it's wandered off from there, I was amused that the concept of "only mostly dead" came up again here. I did rather enjoy how that got handled, for the most part.
Much as I like how this author has a lot of strong women, frequently of dubious/kinda evil nature, by virtue of this being a world where fighting is going on, betrayals are going on, etc....ladies die a lot. And it bummed me out to lose good characters, even if there's plot-related reasons for that. I did like the explanations of the previous Warlords and their um, work, though.
I liked the side romances in this one--they don't get much time, but they're sweet. I particularly enjoyed Ama's brother Ferdinand's relationship with his lady love, who's had a sudden rise of status that may get in the way of their relationship. I don't know if I've ever been madly in love with Ama and Luca's relationship like I'm supposed to be, but I do enjoy how they utterly support each other, especially in a backstabby world.
In the end...well, I'll spoiler space that one for you. But I'll say it felt kinda like a fizzle and a "too easy" last-minute wrap-up that didn't feel like it would work for the world that was set up.
Three and a half stars. I enjoyed this series but always kind of felt like it could be a bit better, somehow.
Spoiler space
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Ama and Luca fight the patriarchy by well...quitting. She decides to dissolve the kingdom, remove the monarchy, and let the people set up their own government, and Luca agrees. This happens on the third to the last page of the book (then they elope), and...that's it. Happy ending! I guess? I'm not at all sure how they plan to enforce this, because just announcing to the patriarchy and walking away seems like something a bunch of bad dudes would fight to the end to stop. Or maybe have a third book, but this series feels pretty well "nope, I'm done" about it. It just seemed like too easy of a finish to say you're going to dissolve royalty. Maybe the author petered out/couldn't think of how to fight the patriarchy*, I don't know. But it felt like a fizzle-y ending to me. Eh....I wish it was that easy, but good luck to the married couple, I suppose.
* I feel like I should mumble some things right now about Queen Elizabeth/the empire/colonization and how I sorta doubt she alone had the power to undo all of that shit if she'd wanted to because historical institutions, but I am not an expert on that particular topic and thus will shut up.
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