Reviews

Reckoning by Lilith Saintcrow, Lili St. Crow

tynga's review against another edition

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4.0

Dru has been through a lot since her father’s death and the experience she gained from the crazy chain of challenges she overcame will be necessary to face what’s to come. After saving Graves and Ash (more-or-less) she now finds herself on the run, trying to keep the three of them alive against swarms of Vampires, the Order (whom she’s not sure she can trust) and a whole new enemy. But what will she do when treason comes from a source she never foresaw? Will her blooming, or even the voices in her head, be enough to save their hides?

True to the previous books in the series, Lilith Saintcrow offered an action-packed installment. Things started a bit slow with the three teenagers hitting the road in a stolen car but it doesn’t take that long before the sh*t hits the metaphorical fan. Numerous fights take place in Reckoning and our heroine will have to face them among friends, alone or worst, side-by-side with a traitor, promising a string of surprising events. I stayed on my toes the whole time and I enjoyed it!

One of the things I love the most about this series is the way Dru always bounces back from whatever puts her down and I wasn’t disappointed. Dru might be young, but she’s got some real world experience under her belt and she is very determined and resourceful. Two qualities hitting high on the kick-ass heroine scale. The secondary characters also delivered a good show! Graves’ mood swing annoyed the hell out of me, Christophe’s honesty surprised me and what to say about Ash? He might only have the vocabulary of a two years old, but I love him to pieces.

A lot of issues will be solved in this novel and even though I liked the end of book, a je ne sais quoi was missing to make it a satisfying end to the series. I guess I would’ve liked Dru to head on a path to assume her leader’s responsibility and *slight spoilers alert* for her to choose which boy she wants to be with, instead of leaving both relationships opened *end of spoilers* but overall it wasn’t bad.

The Strange Angels series has a strong Supernatural (the TV show) vibe, with a YA twist that really got me hooked from the beginning. Now that the series is over, it’s a great opportunity for you to read it all without suffering the torture of awaiting the next installment. Lilith Saintcrow delivers an action-packed series with strong characters that will definitely appeal to YA lovers. All fun and spunk without a sorry-for-herself weepy heroine, much better than so many YA series out there!

lesliethewanderlust's review against another edition

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4.0

I can’t believe this is the last book in the series.

In Reckoning Dru is still running from— and fighting the vampires that want her dead, with Graves and Ash along for the ride. Her attempt at an escape doesn’t last long and she has a final showdown with Christophe’s father Sergei. She also makes a surprising alliance with the Maharaj, who claim she may be one of them. (Descendants of human and magic beings mixed I think)

As usual Dru’s feelings for Christophe and Graves changes in relation to whomever she’s with at the time. When she’s with Graves she wants him, when she’s with Christophe she wants him. I wonder if there will ever be a book written without the standard love triangle, I’d love to read about a solid couple for once.

It would have been nice if there were more of a resolution. By the end of the book Graves leaves, Dru doesn’t choose between her two boys and the Maharaj’s connection to Dru is still a mystery. My fingers are crossed that Lilli St. Crow will write another book in the series.

bookish_spoonie's review against another edition

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2.0

2.5 Stars

I am NOT HAPPY. What one earth was that ending?? How did she not choose Graves OR Christophe?!?! This doesn't make sense and I am fuming that I read the entire series and got no closure! Plus she opened up a storyline about another race of magic wealders right at the end? I thought I was wrong and there was more books but nope, that really was the end. I am NOT happy.

Also the Sergei ending was so lacking that it was a huge let down.
I really enjoyed this series but this ending was rubbish and I am just going to make up an ending in my head as I won't accept this one!!

themedreads's review against another edition

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4.0

This book took so many turns that were so unexpected that all you could do was binge this book to get to the conclusion. I ended up reading this book in a few hours, I just couldn't put it down.

I will say, this book was good but not as good as the first book in this series. There were times this book just got to be a little much, and predictable but overall I really enjoyed this. I was pleasantly surprised at how many times I thought the book would take a certain direction to only be wrong, I actually liked that I didn't know at times what was going to happen next. There were a few times I predicted things but it didn't ruin the book for me at all.

And as I have ranted on my last reviews, finally Dru realized how creepy Christophe actually is.

"Okay," I began. "You're too old for me. You're scary. It's creepy that you were so all over my mom and now you're all over me...."

Yes, thank you Dru for realizing how awful this obsession is and how many major red flags are thrown around. It's so gross that I honestly don't know how others can approve and even hope for this relationship. Christophe would have been a much better character if a romantic relationship wasn't on the table. He could have easily been a big brother to Dru, but unfortunately, Lili St. Crow went the romantic route which is a shame. This aspect alone brings my rating down, I just can't jump on board with these relationships.

The end of the book was a bit underwhelming but I was still happy with how it ended.

Overall I found this book good, I would re-read this series again as I really did like the overall story. I just wish a few things were different, but oh well it was still a good read. I give this book a 4 -star rating and would recommend this series.




saviola's review against another edition

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3.0

It took me a whole week to finish reading Reckoning because it was so hard to get hooked into. It's not that the plot isn't interesting; it is: Dru on the run, fighting off suckers left and right, things blowing up, tons of fighting and action, Christophe and Graves, 'nuff said. But, it's just so anticlimatic. I feel like Ms. St. Crow's southern-flared style of writing doesn't coalesce quite well with all the butt-kicking and it sort of washes out the action, if you know what I mean. Which by the way, I can't be the only one who gets driven mad by her style of writing. It's pretty much incomprehensible most of the time. The way she describes things that are happening makes you want to ask "WHAT'S HAPPENING?!" It's completely mind-blowing. Sometimes she never fully describes how something happens and then later she'll bring it up and say something happened that you didn't know happened. For example: Dru was fighting suckers and she was trying to tell Ash to go find Graves, but he was hesitant to leave her. In order to make him obey she had to do something specific, but you're not really told what. All it says is that she felt the "touch" in her mind, like always, and then Ash yelped and ran off to find Graves... I read that part over like three times before I just moved on. Then later Dru says something about being able to use the "touch" to make Ash obey and all I thought was "Oh, is that what happened? How was I supposed to know that? Her "touch" is ALWAYS flexing and reaching and whatever else, how was I supposed to know that time was any different?" Anyway, a lot of the book is like that, and most of the time there are no explanations, later on or otherwise.

So, it's either that, or I'm just fed up with Dru's inner-monologue. It grates on my brain like glass on a chalkboard. It's the same crap EVERY TIME! She misses her dad and gran and is always imagining things they would do or say if they were still with her, she's sad because her life is a total abysmal wreck and she keeps ruining it worse and worse, she's always hurting and exhausted "to the core", she's always got something lodged in her throat and needs to swallow, and she's pretty much in a continuous state of weeping throughout the entire book. Blah Blah Blah, right? I'm tired of her stupid stretching "touch", and her mother's hot-cold locket, and her citrusy-flavored tongue. All of which are unexplained, by the way. And what's up with her attitude? Christophe nearly dies multiple times for her and in the end she tells him he's creepy and old? Graves almost dies for her once, sells her out multiple other times, and then she cries because he doesn't want to be her boyfriend? FOR-EFFING-REAL?! I just... I can't.

Anyway, if you're anything like me, you hate to see a series end. I've been devastated at times to have to say goodbye to some of my favorite characters; however, that is not the case with Strange Angels. I don't think it's because I don't care - although I was quite relieved to see the last page - but more that I don't really believe it's ending, because that was not an ending. Reckoning's "ending" involves the introduction of a new race of people with more information on who Dru really is, someone leaving but promising to come back, people still missing, problems still needing to be solved, and Dru still not knowing what she wants (Really? that's the type of thing you do at the beginning of a series. By the time it ends you should have gone through some sort of self-discovery or period of enlightenment and decided what, and who, you want.) Which, by the way, "What does Dru stand for anyway?"... "I'll tell you when you come back." WHAT?! Not an ending. Especially that Epilogue. That was the most irrelevant Epilogue I have ever read. Mark my words: It is not finished.

If this truly is the end, and you haven't started the series yet, DON'T! This "ending" is too dissapointing to bother reading through the whole series. If you've started it, you might as well finish, but don't expect any feelings of satisfaction and resolve.

ecsun345's review against another edition

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4.0

Meh... Not bad

l1brarygirl's review against another edition

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3.0

I'm kind of disappointed in the "last" book. There were many unanswered questions regarding what Dru is and even what Dru is short for?! AND she didn't REALLY make a decision when it came to the two men in her life. So that was disappointing.

jadedcreator's review against another edition

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1.0

SpoilerThis book...was rough. It took me months to get through. The author decided to change up her writing style for this book and throw in some odd stylistic big words. Or overuse a phrase and then never use it again. The descriptions also could drag on to the point where it was a slog to get through. I would set it down and dread picking it back up.

Dru never stops whining for an adult to come fix her problems. She's a "badass" one moment (the story tells us to call her that!) and completely useless another, unpredictably and through until the end. She's so "broken." She doesn't know how to use her words. Graves won't stop projecting instead of communicating. Christopher is so freaking condescending he makes my stomach turn. And why is Ash now a child?

After all that, there's NO answer to the love triangle, she just drags both of them on. Dru has no growth except "now her dead family members are all inside of her/with her." She couldn't even kill Sergej on her own! And the Maharaj were a clearly unplanned side detour that got completely derailed and was 'anticlimactic' (in the author's own words.) We got tiny obscure mentions of another world throughout all the books, and then a "big reveal" that actually taught us nothing, adding another false and randomly dispatched enemy (like Anna).

What happened to this story? Huge disappointment.

bookrobin's review

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4.0


I've always loved Lili St. Crow's books, and this series has been great. Dru's story had been a wild ride of fear, death and the kind of page-turning excitement that has every reader rushing through the book, desperate to know how it will end and what is the answer to the all crucial question will Dru make it out alive. Lili has kept us all on the edges of our seats with these books and I'm so sad it's stopped. In this last book, I got back, what I saw in the first book. A tough-as-hell, bad-ass Dru who kicks sucker ass. It wasn't all action though, it had it's sad points those moments where you could really feel Dru's pain. Her life isn't perfect, hell it's shit.

This series had problems but overall this was a good way to wrap it up

lucy_rain_and_cupcakes's review against another edition

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2.0

Still too many repeating crap, even though it's inside of Dru's head but I don't really care that how she wake up with her boxer twist around. Or how they smell (it just repeating crap)

It's kind of annoying that she can't admit she has feeling for both of them. I mean really Dru, both of them are ready to die for you one way or another, it's really not cool the string them along. I get that there is too much going on and she needs time. But every time she's in one's arm and thinking about another is getting old. Like I said, string them along.

It's seem like she is pretty much running from one place to another throughout the book, and ended up being capture anyway. Almost die, then someone sacrificed, she then roll on a power trip and save the day. The plots was alright, I scan through quite a bit, was getting pretty bored. In the end this book was just alright for me. I don't like the ending, it's almost like she was punished him (you know whom I am speaking of).