Review – The Shadowglass (The Bone Witch, Book 3) by Rin Chupeco (3.5/5 stars)
Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Dark Fantasy
Length: 480 pages
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Release Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN-13: 978-1492660606
Stand Alone or Series: 3rd book in the Bone Witch series
Source: Borrowed from Library
Rating: 3.5/5 stars
“In the Eight Kingdoms, none have greater strength or influence than the asha, who hold elemental magic. But only a bone witch has the power to raise the dead. Tea has used this dark magic to breathe life into those she has loved and lost…and those who would join her army against the deceitful royals. But Tea’s quest to conjure a shadowglass, to achieve immortality for the one person she loves most in the world, threatens to consume her.
Tea’s heartsglass only grows darker with each new betrayal. Her work with the monstrous azi, her thirst for retribution, her desire to unmask the Faceless―they all feed the darkrot that is gradually consuming her heartsglass.
She is haunted by blackouts and strange visions, and when she wakes with blood on her hands, Tea must answer to a power greater than the elder asha or even her conscience. Tea’s life―and the fate of the kingdoms―hangs in the balance.”
This is the final book in The Bone Witch series. This was my least favorite book of the trilogy but it does do a good job of tying things up. This book was slower than the other two and harder to follow.
The book alternates between the near past and the present. In the near past Tea is trying to learn how to make shadowglass and eliminate the azi once and for all. In the present Tea is leading her azi in a rampage through the kingdoms.
I think part of my issue with this book was that the scenes from the present and past were just too similar. It got difficult to keep all the characters and what they were doing straight when they were in two places at slightly different timepoints. There were just too many characters and the timepoints were too close.
This was also a much more intrigue and politically driven story which I am not a fan of. Additionally, the book just moves way too slow compared with the first two books in the series.
It was great to see how everything wraps up. The writing is beautiful and I still enjoyed the description and the world.
Overall this was a decent conclusion to this series. I struggled a bit with all the characters (so many names that start with ‘K’!) and with how close in time the two perspectives were. I also thought this was the slowest book of the series and could have used some better editing to tighten things up.
