It’s okay to love someone through their mistakes, but I feel she should have had to work harder to earn back the little bit of peace she got from their relationship in the end. I think he forgave her for everything a little too easily. I think while it was important that she got to the point where she would have killed Audric had Eliana not stopped her, I think she should have had to work a little harder to earn Audric’s trust back. This book showed her getting real twisted and bad, and for the first time I saw her as nearly as much of a villian as Corien and didn’t have much pity for her at all throughout. I’m not really sure that Rielle deserved the redemption that she got.

Here are the two main problems I had with this book, besides being mildly depressed through nearly all of it: However, Legrand offers a masterclass in worldbuilding, engaging though sometimes slow-moving plot lines, and the most morally ambiguous cast of characters you’ll find anywhere (except for Audric, who is a cinnamon bun). So if you’re looking for something lighthearted, Lightbringer might be one to save for later. In all but perhaps the last one hundred pages, all four of our “heroes”, Rielle, Audric, Simon, and Eliana, are utterly tormented and trapped within their own hells. I would also like to say that this is probably the heaviest of all three of the books. I’ll definitely do a re-read of all three books someday though, so I can get the full picture, because I’m sure there are some things I missed due to waiting at least a year between each book. Fifty pages in I nearly put the book down and thought about doing a re-read, but that’s close to 1200 combined pages in the previous two books, so I decided to forge on through. However, this is the second sequel in a row where the author, in my opinion, breaks the unspoken rule where the writer must give little hints of the major plot points from the previous book within the first 50-100 pages as a little refresher. This bob-and-weave between two different timelines and multiple perspectives (though it does stay in third person throughout) might be confusing and overwhelming in most situations, but Legrand masterfully blends this story together to make it cohesive and comprehensible throughout. This is a very large cast story, especially since it transcends two different timelines, and in this final installment I believe you get more perspectives than ever before. If you’ve read the previous two books in this trilogy, you expect an epic conclusion, and Legrand does not disappoint.

I’ll be sure and mark the section with spoilers in big print. Most of it will be spoiler-free, but I’ve got some opinions and I would really like to share them. This review will, however, contain some spoilers. This is the final book in the series, so I don’t feel the need to post a summary, but I just wanted to do a brief review.

Empirium book