Hmm. The one thing I've liked about the Alex books, is that as a diviner he's massively underpowered compared to the people he goes against, and has to get by with his wits, skills and a little help from his friends. However Alex is now faced with temptation - he has the chance to become more absolutely powerful. His friends and lover are in constant danger because of his refusal to side with either the Light or the Dark, but now he finally has to make a choice.

Which is a shame. ( )

Staking your life on people not figuring out a secret is a dangerous business. And Alex and his friends had done exactly that. So when the secret of what Anne has become finally becomes known (not surprisingly, it is Caldera who finally figures it out), things get really uncomfortable for Alex and Anne. By the end of the novel, Alex is finally forced to make choices he had been trying not to - and to drop his niceness - turning into what Richard always wanted him to be and the Council always suspected him to be - a Dark Mage (except that everyone is still up for a surprise - Alex has more cards to play than expected).

Plus Starbreeze is back. Which adds some randomness to the whole thing... as usual.

The novel serves a prequel to the endgame - it gets everyone where they need to be, it gets some conflicts resolved (and some get much worse), it gets the jinns fully into the story and start closing all possible futures but the one that leads to the end. And as the author is preparing to close the series, some dangling threads from earlier books are starting to get weaved back in. It is a good thing this series has a planned ending - a lot of the decisions, choices and deaths in the last books make Alex's story unsustainable as a long running series. ( )

This is the book that should not be read first. It is the final buildup of everything that has been happening to Alex and his friends. There are a few small bright spots but for the most part things are not good for Alex and his friends. By the end of the book Alex has made decisions that he really can’t change. The Light mages have never really accepted Alex since he had a Dark teacher and things in this book finally push Alex away from them. A good book but hard to discuss without giving something away. ( )

One of the best books of the whole series, I cried, stood in awe of the solutions, and at the end was incredibly satisfied by the ending. Seriously think that there is a discrepancy with another series like the Dresden Files, I believe this should be just as popular or more to it, feel like the editorial team isnt working hard enough to push it, no real wiki, small reddit community, pity, because its an amazing series. ( )

Verus finally does what he should have done before. Now, we'll see what we'll see. ( )