Aisling

I was enamored of this series at the start, but I increasingly wearied of it; I stuck with it because the central character, Indigo, is (was?) so compelling. I began to feel, along the way, as if Louise Cooper herself were growing tired of the revenge-quest conceit. This final book really felt like a betrayal, both of Indigo and of the readers. Shifting points of view dilute the power of the narrative, and the "twist" felt like a cheap shot, a gimmicky way to appropriate emotional power without any narrative coherence. This final book has soured me on the entire series. Boo.

So at last the eight book trilogy reaches its final volume. After enjoying vols 4 - 7 (I found 1 - 3 weak and disappointing) I was expecting another interesting read. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case and there was a distinct sense of anti-climax.

Indigo and her sentient wolf friend Grimya are returning by ship to Indigo's island homeland where the tragedy which launched her long quest occurred. There is one more demon to defeat before she can be reunited with her beloved, Fenran. But things soon go amiss when the ship is caught in a storm and wrecked. Although they survive, the two friends are separated, Grimya is physically injured and Indigo suffers from amnesia. A sailor aboard the ship, who had nutured hopes that Indigo might come show more to love him and which she had been too soft-hearted to quell, then tells everyone that he and Indigo are betrothed. Luckily he is not such a sleaze as to take physical advantage, and he has a few qualms of conscience, but Indigo ends up depending on him and rejecting anything that might remind her of her true nature - including Grimya.

Grimya spends a lot of time with the true hero of this book, a witch woman from the forest, called Niahrin. It is she who drives the action and I liked her character and also that of the queen dowager, a tough older woman who has to sometimes use subterfuge to get round the pigheadedness of her son the king. Strange things are happening at the castle where they live, which seems haunted by hostile presences, and these presences are tied up with Indigo.

I wasn't expecting everything to be happy ever after with Indigo becoming queen, although she has more right to the throne than the existing family, being the sole survivor of the previous royal line, the present monarchy having been created by appointment when it seemed the first had died out due to a plague. (For some reason, never explained, everyone in the islands recalls the unleashing of the demons by Indigo's arrogant meddling, and the subsequent bloodbath as a deadly plague.) I wouldn't have minded if she had overcome the final demon, and perhaps been reunited with Fenran or not - a nice twist would have been that she had matured due to her experiences and found she had outgrown him. She and Grimya could have ridden off into the sunset and I would've been content.

But instead there is a really weird twist that Fenran is the final demon which doesn't make sense because the person it revolves around existed before Anghara/Indigo ever unleashed the demons in book 1. Not only that, but Indigo reverts to the really annoying person she used to be, especially in the first three volumes, where she never believes Grimya and does stupid things because of it - so I found it hard to accept the description of her as a mature individual who had learned from her quest - and in this book she does exactly the same thing again. Not only that, but she behaves like a lovestruck teen as if none of her previous growth had ever happened. And considering Grimya's previous injuries, I found it difficult to square the fact that she had been hobbling around with her feats of endurance towards the end of the story. So I would have liked a different plotline. I also see why a happy ending was reserved for Niahrin -I liked her too - but in my book that could have involved her and Grimya teaming up. Goodness knows Grimya deserved better!

For these reasons, making a weak ending to an enjoyable series, I can only award the book 3 stars. show less

If there was one thing I didn't fancy much of the series as a whole, it was the whole Fenran issue and her single-mindedness about it, as well Indigo's general behavior when it came to him or just her having to face the demons.
But mostly, it was the Fenran issue. I figured if they were holding him as a prize for the last book it would be for a reason, and lo and behold, it was- because he was the last demon. Color me shocked. Not.

While I admit I wouldn't have been happy with a typical ending (Indigo saves the day, gets a happily ever after with Fenran as Queen), I wasn't at all happy with the ending we were given.
The amnesia thing was completely dumb (and slow, and dragged out); Vinar was an hypocritical, annoying idiot; and if I'd been show more Grimya I would've let Indigo to rot and gone off with the wolf pack, because I'd sure as hell be tired of her behavior towards me. Indigo always refuses to listen to her, rarely takes her advise, and when faced with giving her five minutes to explain or going with Fenran, she chooses Fenran: You waited fifty years, you can wait five minutes for your friend.

Never mind that she totally seemed to forget there was a last demon.

Never mind that the whole last demon ordeal was just lame.

Fenran suddenly being a sorry, greedy SOB that went mad made little sense to me (although I admit I enjoyed the contrast of Indigo's memories to what he really was, it just doesn't seem like a good ending for a book of this style - at least for my taste).

I enjoyed the witch, but it all happening with her on the last book was too fast for me to really care about her.

In brief, all in all, while I overall rather enjoyed the series, this last installment was disappointing, and if I'm not rating it a 1 it's only because Grimya is awesome.

So, here's the ending I'm rewriting for myself:
Grimya goes live happily ever after with the wolf pack, Vinar jumps off a cliff, the current royal family remains the current royal family, and Fenran and Indigo go into the Tower of Regrets never to be seen again (they can go mad and fight each other and their own demons forever and ever, locked in there, not bothering anyone else). show less