Review for Beautiful Redemption (Caster Chronicles #4) by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

TITLE: Beautiful Redemption
SERIES: Caster Chronicles #4
AUTHOR: Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl
PUBLICATION DATE: October 23, 2012
PUBLISHER: Little, Brown Books For Young Readers
PAGES: 456 pages
FORMAT: Audiobook / Hardback
SOURCE: Borrowed / Purchased
RATING: 4 stars

Ethan Wate has spent the majority of his life fighting to get out of Gatlin SC, to go off to college and see the world and never permanently return to this southern life. Now, he’s fighting to get back home. After swan-diving off the water tower to save everyone he loves, he finds that death is quite a bit like life. Most of the dead is present, in their Gatlin-like homes attempting to finish their unfinished business. Now, Ethan is more determined than ever to find a way back from the grave and Lena is doing everything she can from the other side to help. Can these two defy the laws of nature to be together?

Like this last novel, this was a bit hit and miss for me. Once again, we get the same old gang, with a few new additions. We finally get to really meet Lila Evers Wate in the afterlife and Amma’s greats. We get a few new underworld allies, but it’s more or less the same group as it ever was fighting. This time they aren’t really fighting for good or evil, but more to reunite Ethan and Lena because….they can’t live without each other? Don’t get me wrong, I wanted a happy ending to this series and this gives us that, but they defy more than one of nature’s laws here and it’s all for personal gain, which I think is a big no-no. The story does have a romantic twinge, with Ethan literally fighting his way back from death to be with Lena because he loves her so much.

It’s written in that same fascinating way the rest of the series is, with Garcia and Stohl becoming the perfect writing duo, but I had a few issues. There is my obligatory spill on character death because another beloved character dies. Not one of the main six, but it broke my heart nonetheless. When one of the sisters died in the last book, it was a major downer, but this was worse.

My other main issue is that this wasn’t as enrapturing as the others had been. I wasn’t really invested in the story. Maybe I’m annoyed at the characters? Maybe it’s because the plot was so predictable it was impossible to not see how it was going to end? I don’t really know the why, all I can tell you is that I didn’t put in extra effort into finishing this. I listened to the majority of it on audiobook (I got my book out and read the last 50 or so pages, but the rest was all audio). I’m an audio addict. It started as a way to help consume books during my lunch hour but still have time to eat and let the dogs out and so on. Most of the time, I end up listening to whatever book it is outside the normal lunch hour. Take Attachments by Rainbow Rowell, which is what I’m currently listening to. I listen at lunch and then I usually come home and listen for another hour afterwork while I do housework and I have to force myself to stop. That’s how I usually am with audiobooks, it’s so effortless that I find myself listening more and more, but it wasn’t the case with this. I listened for my lunch hour everyday, but no more. I didn’t go out of my way at all to get just a few more minutes in.

This novel wraps most everything in this series up in a nice little bow. You get the conclusion we have been waiting on since we finished the first book and it’s nice and neat, but somehow not perfect. This series started out with great promise and though it remains a solid 4-star series to me, my love for it has dwindled a bit. The announcement of Ridley’s book next in a new spinoff series excited me a great deal, but having already read it as well, I can say that maybe I need to just leave this world be because it’s all downhill from here.

Review for Beautiful Chaos (Caster Chronicles #3) by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

TITLE: Beautiful Chaos
SERIES: Caster Chronicles #3
AUTHOR: Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl
PUBLICATION DATE: October 18, 2011
PUBLISHER: Little, Brown Books For Young Readers
PAGES: 516 pages
FORMAT: Audiobook / Hardback
SOURCE: Borrowed / Purchased
RATING: 4 stars

Ethan Wate’s life is never going to be normal. He and Lena return home to find things are stranger in Gatlin than when they left. Apparently Lena broke things a bit when she refused to choose a side and now everything has gone pear-shaped. And even worse, Ethan is being haunted both in dreams and in real life and he’s slowly losing himself. The gang needs to get things together and quick because the wheel of fate is going to crush them all if they don’t make things right.

I’m at a bit of a loss for what to say here. We get the same cast that we had in the previous novels, with more of John Breed and Olivia. They are on a journey to set the order of things straight again since Lena fucked them up when she “skipped” her moon. I still love Ethan and Lena and their relationship, but it’s far from perfect and that shows here more than ever. Ethan spent much of the last book with Olivia because Lena ran off with John and now he isn’t allowed to see her because it upsets Lena. So we have this sorta-not-really love triangle thing happening that irritated me to no end. But Lena has no qualms talked to John Breed even though it’s the exact same situation as Ethan and Liv. Which pissed me off. Then the predictable thing happens.****SPOILER****John turns out to be a “good” guy who was being controlled by Abraham and he falls head over heels for Liv. I hate how they get together seemingly just to make them all pair up. Ethan and Lena, Link and Ridley, and ooops….John and Liv are left out so let’s just push them together, right? Okay…ooo…look aren’t they cute? All joking aside, they do have a bit in common, but I hate how it happened nonetheless****END SPOILER****

Then there is the whole Link and Ridley situation in general. Rid is human now and Link is quarter incubus, so you’d think the majority of the problems are solved, right? Rid can be good and Link can be her almost human boyfriend and they ride off into the proverbial sunset, yeah?

Or not…..

FFFFFUUUUUCCCCCKKKKK. Is that too much to ask? To have Link and Ridley finally get their shit together. Or rather, to have Ridley finally get her shit together? This was a big forshadowing moment in my lifetime that I missed because from this point on, my opinion of Ridley just sinks lower and lower. That’s a depressing thing because I really liked her in Beautiful Creatures, despite the fact that she was a quasi-villain and she redeems herself a tad in Beautiful Redemption…but then she falls again and I just want to punch her in the fucking face.

Besides my obvious hangups about characters, this novel has one big issues, the huge motherfucking cliffhanger. This books ends in quite possibly the worst cliffhanger I have ever read. Now, I know what you are all thinking: But Tabitha, don’t you already have a copy of the next book? Isn’t the audiobook queued up just waiting on this to end? Yes, it is, but it’s the goddamn principle. I know a lot of people read these books as soon as they were released and I cannot imagine having to wait for a year or more to find out what happens next. This is not fucking necessary. It’s infuriating. I’ve been letting cliffhangers slide lately, but this was over the line.

Despite my anger and my issues, this was still a highly enjoyable installment of the Caster Chronicles. You get a bit of mystery and a bit of action and a lot of Ethan/Lena romance. You get more of that swoon-worhty southern charm that is Ethan Wate. Just be warned that you’ll want to have the next novel close on hand because the ending leaves a lot to be desired.