The Snow Queen's shadow

Pros: great series conclusion, fast paced/

Cons: one scene felt superfluous/

Bea is dying and Snow has a plan to keep her around longer. When her spell goes wrong she unwittingly releases something that takes control of her and others, Prince Jakob being a strange exception. So she takes the boy when she leaves Lorindar's Palace and heads for home./

Making a beloved protagonist into the antagonist made this concluding volume of the Princess Series a heart wrenching one. By the end of the book ‘Snow' has done so many horrible things it's hard to imagine a good ending. But Hines delivers one that fits the subject matter and neatly wraps up the series./

The pacing is fast - it's a quick, exciting read. The protagonists' trip to see the fairies seems superfluous, but it's tied into the overarching plot well, making it a minor complaint./

If you haven't read this series, what are you waiting for?

Jim C. Hines brings his Princess series to a close with this revisioning of the Snow Queen fairy tale (with a touch of Hansel and Gretel thrown in for the only giggles this tome provides).

This isn't a standalone novel, nor is it a good jumping on point–this is the end of the road for these friends, and pretty near every page screams that. As such, it's great. A couple of plot points are tied up, every character gets a good (not positive, but solid) resolution to their arc, and we're reminded once again (as we've been told throughout this story) not everyone's story ends with a happily ever after.

Great conclusion to a really good series. The only thing I want to know is how DAW managed to sneak in a bunch of pollen between the pages in the last couple of chapters–‘cuz that's the only explanation for what happened to my eyes that I can think of.