They say every story has a beginning, a middle, an almost-ending and the true ending. It sucks that I couldn’t even get through the middle to see how this magical world’s almost-ending or true ending panned out. Stephanie Garber’s Finale comes with a lot of threads to tie together and balls to juggle but unfortunately this performance lacks entertainment in my eyes and has come to a crashing halt.

Going into this I was uncertain how I truly feel about the characters, the plot, the setting and so on. Those who have read my Legendary post will know how torn I am between details and specific elements of the story. this is a reread for me, by the way, but I honestly can’t tell you how I felt about that first read-through given I have no written record of it and I don’t remember the plot points of the second half of the book. I couldn’t even remember that we have a dual perspective situation in this book and I was talking to a bookstagram friend about the pitfalls of Finale and how it should’ve been both perspectives (a testament to how relevant Scarlett’s perspective is perhaps?).

I say this as a reader who knows she’s moving away from YA narrative perspective and needs a more mature, grounded voice to follow – this book is boring for me. I don’t care for anyone here, especially not Scarlett, and I still vividly remember that the girls are barely adults. Tella is seventeen, is she not? I don’t care for the pending battle between mortal, immortals and the Fates. I don’t care for any of the romantic relationships or the sibling relationships. I don’t care for their mother who they saved at the end of Legendary, the revelations that crop up through the beginning and the portion of the middle I managed to drag myself through. It’s all just flat to me. There’s nothing to hook me in, nothing to tease me deeper into the story before something digs its claws into my attention span and force me to read until the very end. It’s a shame because I really wanted to read this in its entirety and move onto Once Upon A Broken Heart but I don’t think I can do that. I think it is safe for me to say that Stephanie Garber’s writing isn’t for me.

She’s not the first popular reread I’ve DNFed this month. I was intending to start writing on The Folk of Air Trilogy but I couldn’t get further than 120 pages into The Cruel Prince. Again, I’ve accepted that Holly Black is another author whose writing isn’t suited for me and I’m okay with that. I’m glad there are people who do appreciate both authors and what their stories bring into the world. It’s interesting how this happens at different rates for people and how they react upon realising it. To be fair I think I subconsciously knew years ago when I sold my copies of The Folk of Air Trilogy and The Caraval Trilogy.