Darkdawn Book Review
Darkdawn by Jay Kristoff
WARNING: NEEDLESS TO SAY, THIS REVIEW IS OF THE THIRD BOOK IN THE SERIES SO WHILE THIS REVIEW IS SPOILER FREE FOR DARKDAWN IT WILL CONTAIN MAJOR SPOILERS FOR NEVERNIGHT AND GODSGRAVE. IF YOU SCROLL DOWN, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED, GENTLEFRIENDS.
From Goodreads: A ruthless young assassin’s journey for revenge comes to a stunning end in the conclusion of this acclaimed epic fantasy trilogy.
The Republic of Itreya is in chaos. Mia Corvere has assassinated Cardinal Duomo and rumors of Consul Scaeva’s death ripple through the street of Godsgrave like wildfire. But buried beneath those same streets, deep in the ancient city’s bones, lies a secret that will change the Republic forever.
Mia and her brother Jonnen must journey through the depths of the ancient metropolis. Their quest will take them through the Godsgrave underdark, across the Sea of Swords, back to the library of the Quiet Mountain and the poisoned blades of Mia’s old mentors, and at last the fabled Crown of the Moon. There, Mia will at last discover the origins of the darkin, and learn the destiny that lies in store for her and her world. But with the three suns now in descent, and Truedark on the horizon, will she survive?
Wow oh wow. There’s so much to talk about here. And I’m still kind of in shock that this series is now over.
I was fortunate enough to go to one of the UK Darkdawn tour events and to hear Jay speak about this amazing book in person. From his talk and his social media, I knew we’d be in for a lot of death and destruction in this one. There’s also, according to the introduction of the first book, the death of Mia herself [I maintain this is not a spoiler considering it is right there on page one of the first book].
Darkdawn reaaaallly doesn’t pull any punches. While I absolutely loved Nevernight and Godsgrave, this was honestly something else completely for me. Every now and then, a book comes along that is practically god-like tier. This is one of those books. The writing style is simply magnificent. There’s a lot of the writer’s style that shines through, particularly in the witty narration style. Yet what struck me is that, when we finally learn who the mysterious chronicler is, it also works perfectly with the style. I will say there’s not as many footnotes in this book, and I love how the footnotes become an actual punchline throughout the story [be prepared for things to get rather meta]. The language is just breathtaking. From the short, adrenaline-inducing sentences to the long, glorious descriptions, it’s incredibly hard to find anything that doesn’t fit like a perfect piece of the puzzle.
The descriptions were something beyond anything I imagined here. The imagery is stunning, cinematic, stuff. It made it so I was wide-eyed every time we got to one of the big moments in the book, from meaningful deaths [again, I don’t think this actually counts as a spoiler], to the imagery of Mia’s shadowerk, to the gigantic and awe-inspiring fight scenes. I particularly loved the way Kristoff plays with the space on the page when Mia steps through shadows. The fights, too, were just wow. I can see them so clearly in my head, and although in any other book I’d probably shake my head and say the author has gone too far, here I really didn’t. The book did a wonderful job of showing Mia’s powers and capabilities without her ever going too far. It never seemed like a leap in logic that she was capable of fighting a huge bunch of people at once, or that she could hold her own against the giant host of things that Kristoff throws at her in this book. Which is a massive achievement, in my opinion. All too often, I leave an epic fight scene in a book either feeling like it was implausible that the main character could beat all these people on their own, or I feel like the author has cheated slightly and used magic as a crutch to explain how one person could defeat an army of a thousand or so. So finding that balance and making it believable takes major skill, in my eyes. Plus, there is the addition of pirates in this novel and that scene with the pirate king that I won’t go into any more detail with, but holy shit this is everything I ever needed in a book. This is, without trying to sound bitchy or negative, what I wanted when I picked up Throne of Glass.
Although the worldbuilding and the new emphasis on the mythology in this book initially threw me off a bit, again I ended up being incredibly impressed at how well Darkdawn pulls it off. The mythology is a critical piece of the puzzle, and like the others it all just works seamlessly together. I particularly like that we get an explanation for the darklins.
As for the characters, obviously Mia reaches absolute badass status in this novel. If she wasn’t top of your coolest assassin characters ever list, she needs to be put there like yesterday. Again, Kristoff shows amazing nuance at making her cunning and vicious and yet still relatable. She still, somehow, comes across as likeable. Tric too, is one thousand percent scarily good with a sword in this book, yet even as a resurrected dead person, he still somehow manages to be a character I actually liked. He’s got some wonderful moments in this book and I feel like this is the perfect ending to the character he was in the first book. Ashlinn is great too. I’ve never been a huge fan of her, but I think in Ddarkdawn you get to see the side of her that Mia sees, and there are some truly perfect moments between them as they interact [and also a whole lot of smut too. Definitely NSFW content]. My favourite outlier characters have always been Mr. Kindly and Mercurio, so it was brilliant to see them both get some on-page time for their wit.
You’re probably wondering if this book is going to make you cry, especially after all the evil laughing Kristoff tweets. Yes, yes it will. There are many moments throughout the book where I felt myself welling up or gasping, and I can almost guarantee that this is a book that should be read with a box of tissues in easy reach. It’s not just that the book is over, that the series is over, it’s that a lot of poignant things happen, good and bad, throughout Darkdawn and there are some moments that are just so perfect that they deserve to be cried over.
Honestly, overall I can’t help but give Darkdawn a full:
It’s probably the best book I’ve read this year, and it’s just sheer brilliance from the very first page. I can’t possibly recommend this series nearly enough, so if you haven’t already read it what on earth are you doing with your life?
Has anyone else read this book already or plans to? What do you all think of it? Let me know in the comment section down below ❤
