Review: The Descent

Source: eARC courtesy of publisher via NetGalley

Note: this is a review of the third and last book of the trilogy, The Taker, please note there may be spoilers in relation to earlier books

A finale to The Taker trilogy and I was sooo excited! I was really looking forward to whatever twisted end in this last book of the trilogy. I have loved the earlier books with their dark warped beginnings amidst the glittery glamorous setting and the suspenseful hunt / race across the world. They were such exciting moments I never really know where it will take me. I had very high hopes for something equally exhilarating in The Descent

A “mystical island home” sounded somewhat haunting and thrilling, to begin with. However, when it is but a rock and characters don’t go anywhere else, it lost its allure in a very short time. All right, so there were shifts in time and also in ‘dimension’ but in reality, all’s very still… The shifts in ‘dimension’ were what I appreciated most in this novel. It was a completely different world with entertaining characters and overall, quite hopeless in atmosphere. The shifts in time, however, whilst I enjoyed reading through them, in the end, when all was revealed, I felt like it was nothing but page fillers because I don’t understand the pages and pages of it when it really all was but a wisp of nothingness.

In addition, the chapter headers were dead giveaways –I don’t remember this from the earlier books unless if I ignored them… they were easier to ignore since I read physical copies but with ebook, all it took was the nth second I needed to swipe pass to read the header and guessed where it was heading… did I mention that I love how I just never knew where the earlier books will take me? Oh, and yes, there were 2 other minor characters on the island who, at the ending, I’m at a complete loss to understand the purpose of… how can they exist or be there at all when Adair prove to be completely different?

One of the disappointing parts was that we barely got to view Adair’s transformation as he’s basically a changed ‘man’ in this book. The twist about Adair’s nature was what I most appreciate about this book. It would’ve been something I’d given 5 stars for except that moment where he’s revealing his ‘secrets’ to Lahni that completely fell flat to my ears (eyes? brain?). Again, I don’t understand the big shame of this ‘secret’ with all the Greeks & Roman history & mythologies around… this ‘secret’ seemed to me would be something of the norm that I just couldn’t see what the fuss is all about.

I’m afraid my lack of understanding of this novel contributed heavily to the relatively low rating I gave. I would be very happy to hear from someone… anyone… who can answer my above questions. I really feel that I’ve somehow missed the point 😦

Thank you, Galley Books for preview of eARC via NetGalley

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