The Mirror of Beasts
Ratings1
Average rating4
15
Ratings1
Average rating4
With the dream of Avalon in ruins, Tamsin and her friends are all that stands in the way of Lord Death's plans to unleash the horrors of Anwnn on the world of the living. As the Wild Hunt carves a bloody path across continents, Tamsin is mustering allies, tracking down powerful artifacts, and traversing into new otherlands in search of a way to stop him.
Legend tells of a “Mirror of Beasts,” powerful enough to trap even Lord Death in its accursed glass, but the mirror is not all that it seems. Tamsin must confront her own darkest secrets if she hopes to tap the mirror's strength to defeat her enemies.
Arthurian legend bleeds into contemporary action, and scars of the past are torn open anew by a starcrossed love that refuses to go quietly. This riveting conclusion to the Silver in the Bone duology will hold you in its thrall until the very last page.
Featured Series
2 primary booksSilver in the Bone is a 2-book series with 2 primary works first released in 2023 with contributions by Alexandra Bracken.
Reviews with the most likes.
(4.75) Dark, horrific fantasy with deeply layered lore, complex characters, and a fiercely tender heart beating throughout.
The tone of this book was a definite shift from the first (totally expected after how book one ends), but all the elements that made me love Silver in the Bone are there. The action outnumbers the mystery in this one, and that's saying something because there's still plenty of mystery to unpack. A lot of groundwork was laid in book one and it pays off beautifully.
There's strong themes of friendship, loyalty, and accepting the love you think you don't deserve. A lot of heavy emotions and difficult decisions. The main characters are working through deep grief and betrayal and they don't always handle it well, but that's part of what I liked about it. These characters are flawed, they have complicated motivations, and sometimes they make the wrong decisions but there's always a chance for forgiveness and redemption.
There's only a couple of things holding this back from being a full five star book.
I expected gore, but the slaughter in this book is so unrelenting that I almost found myself getting desensitized to it. The action scenes are very well written and it makes sense within the context of the story, it just started to feel repetitive.
There's a small number of chapters from another character that I truly disliked reading, but you're not supposed to feel sympathetic, so I suppose they did their job. I personally think the ending would have had the same emotional impact without their POV but I can see what it adds to the story.
The book leaves you with a sense of closure while also leaving room for some storylines to continue on. Would absolutely recommend. I think fans of One Dark Window would enjoy this.
This ARC was provided through NetGalley by Random House Children's Books in exchange for honest feedback.
