Beautiful Redemption
Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl
Series: Beautiful Creatures
Preloaded Digital Audio Player
Publisher: Findaway World
Published: October 23, 2012
Source: My Audible account
Goodreads – Amazon
Is death the end . . . or only the beginning?
Ethan Wate has spent most of his life longing to escape the stiflingly small Southern town of Gatlin. He never thought he would meet the girl of his dreams, Lena Duchannes, who unveiled a secretive, powerful, and cursed side of Gatlin, hidden in plain sight. And he never could have expected that he would be forced to leave behind everyone and everything he cares about. So when Ethan awakes after the chilling events of the Eighteenth Moon, he has only one goal: to find a way to return to Lena and the ones he loves.
Back in Gatlin, Lena is making her own bargains for Ethan's return, vowing to do whatever it takes -- even if that means trusting old enemies or risking the lives of the family and friends Ethan left to protect.
Worlds apart, Ethan and Lena must once again work together to rewrite their fate, in this stunning finale to the Beautiful Creatures series.
Review
Ok, y’all. Let’s be honest. I’m not completely pleased with how Garcia and Stohl ended the series. I was excited to start Beautiful Redemption after finishing the amazingness that was Beautiful Chaos…especially after the way the ended it! {Read my review here}
I’m just…in shock at this. Nearly wordless.
Beautiful Redemption left me feeling less than redeemed. Here’s why {and this is going to be spoiler laden, so fair warning}:
- I didn’t feel the connection between Lena and Ethan. Ethan was pining for her from the other world and doing everything he could to get back to Gatlin and her…and I didn’t feel the same sense of urgency from Lena’s story
- BR was split into 3(??) “books,” two from Ethan’s and one from Lena’s POV. Lena seemed weak, unmotivated, and bored. I don’t feel like she loved Ethan enough to actually do or try anything. Garcia and Stohl eluded that the different groups of people were “trying,” but I never actually believed them.
- There were some unanswered, or vaguely dealt with themes. I know that everything can’t be neat and tidy, but there were things that should have been. For example:
- Did the Casters do anything about the rouge Keepers?
- How much time passed while Ethan was away?
- How much time passed before Amma’s obit was published?
- Seraphine…???? I didn’t understand that part AT ALL. I mean really, how did Angeles have control over her after her death?
- Time jumps without introduction confuse me. Greatly. See point above.
- I did not like the female narrator at all. She got all the voices wrong. And I felt very confused because of this.
- Nearly NOTHING about Lena’s story.
- Things seemed to happen a little too easily for Ethan. And regarding Abraham…read the books and you’ll understand.
Now, I did enjoy things about BR, too. Here are a few:
- Ethan is an amazing character. If Lena had half as much character development in the Caster Chronicles as Ethan did, then I might would like her more. Let me get this point across to you: he’s AMAZING. More teen male protagonists need to be like him. He’s strong, polite and respectful, considerate, and still a man. Men don’t have to be jerks to get the girl. More authors need to take note of this.
- I love The Sisters. And Aunt Pru didn’t disappoint. I wish she had gotten more screen time.
- Garcia and Stohl wove together different mythologies, and I appreciated that.
- Even though the ending droned on a little, and really liked the actual last two chapters. There were several points that they could have ended things on—several times that made me sigh with contentedness—yet I’m glad they chose the two ending chapters that they did. They were PERFECT.
- Nearly EVERYTHING about Ethan’s story.
This is by far my least favorite installment in the series. There was so much that just didn’t seem to fit in with the rest of the books.
But this is just my opinion…
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