I received an eARC as part of the blog tour in exchange for an honest review. It has not affected my opinions.
Genre: Fantasy Age Range: YA Star Rating: 3 stars Series: Yes - book 3 CW: child abuse
*SPOILER ALERT: contains SPOILERS for MAGIC UNLEASHED and PROMISES FORGED*
Synopsis:
The path will be forged in sweat and blood.
Rune, Grey, the shape-shifter Beltran, and willful vampire, Verida, set out to rescue their friend and mentor, Tate, from the gladiator games. But first they must navigate the perils of Eon and its warring factions. Each of this band of four carries with them a secret that threatens to tear their group apart from within. Rune now bears the mark of the promise she made to save Grey’s life-a nixie bubble lodged in her arm that could call her away to do their bidding or spell her death.
Even as their loyalty to their cause and to one another faces its greatest test, Rune’s twin brother Ryker is forging an alliance with their mortal enemy, the powerful sorceress Zio, who has plans of her own for the Venators and Eon. Hearts will be bared, secrets unveiled, and relationships made and destroyed in this stunning new installment of the Venators series.
Synopsis taken from Goodreads. Add to your shelves here.
Review:
The third instalment in the Venators series really starts to unpack some of the character relationships, opening up the past of key characters.
I went in wondering if Earth was going to get mentioned, as it had felt a little ignored in the second book. I was glad to see that Rune and Grey did discuss it, and how it played into Rune’s character development.
I liked seeing into Verida, who’s been rather elusive so far, but LEGENDS RISE gives a nice big chunk of her backstory that helped me understand her better, which made her interactions with her family in the latter part of the book that much richer. It also sets up a potential for where the next book might go.
This series is a serialisation that can go on as long as there is demand, rather than a series with a defined arc, and it is starting to show a little. This is both a good and a bad thing.
The stories are semi-episodic, which means that there is a lot of closure (yay!) and the bulk on the main plot is tied up, leading to a mostly satisfying conclusion. There are also sufficient themes and consequences hanging over from previous books (the wolf packs, for example, are continuing to cause problems after Grey and Rune’s actions of the first book) to make the stories feel connected.
However, the lack of an overarching story arc does mean that it feels like there isn’t an end in sight, that the story isn’t build towards something. It’s having an effect on pacing, now that we’re three books in it’s hard to say what this series is going to go, as there’s no defined end.
There are consequences left mentioned but unresolved (presumably for later books) and some characters feel under utilised. We finally get a bit more from Ryker and Zio, with their paths crossing with Grey and Rune. However, they’re still just lurking in the background. I don’t get the sense that Zio is a big bad who’s going to do anything. It’s not feeling like it’s building towards her showing down with the others.
Read my reviews of other books by Devri Walls:
Venators (this series):
- MAGIC UNLEASED (#1)
- PROMISES FORGED (#2)
Sifa Elizabeth Reads 