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fromjuliereads's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
What a finale. Wow.
I absolutely adored Foundryside and while Shorefall had some pacing issues, it was still a great book. But this book. This finale. Absolutely fantastic.
It took me a little bit to get into because I read Shorefall about 2 years ago AND this book takes place 8 years after the end of Shorefall. As soon as I figured that out, I was fully invested. Getting back to these characters, this world. Robert Jackson Bennett writes such a complex world with one of the most unique magic systems I've ever encountered, and these complicated characters that you can't help but love. There were so many aspects to this finale that played out so perfectly. I laughed, I cried, and while I figured out one mystery, there was something in some final reveals that I didn't see comint at all. This is the kind of finale that I truly love.
I absolutely adored Foundryside and while Shorefall had some pacing issues, it was still a great book. But this book. This finale. Absolutely fantastic.
It took me a little bit to get into because I read Shorefall about 2 years ago AND this book takes place 8 years after the end of Shorefall. As soon as I figured that out, I was fully invested. Getting back to these characters, this world. Robert Jackson Bennett writes such a complex world with one of the most unique magic systems I've ever encountered, and these complicated characters that you can't help but love. There were so many aspects to this finale that played out so perfectly. I laughed, I cried, and while I figured out one mystery, there was something in some final reveals that I didn't see comint at all. This is the kind of finale that I truly love.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Grief, Child death, Blood, War, Death, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Slavery, and Violence
Minor: Vomit, Torture, and Toxic relationship
Toxic familial relationships, self-sacrificeaileron's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Torture, Violence, Body horror, Child death, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death and Pandemic/Epidemic
Minor: Abandonment, Genocide, Slavery, War, and Confinement
librarianmage's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief
Moderate: Slavery and Death
Minor: Death of parent and Child death
laguerrelewis's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
What a finale. These books grew in stakes and ambition with every installment, but as the scope rose, so did it’s insight and emotional poignancy. The growth of these characters we love (along with some equally loveable and interesting new addition) is beautiful and profound, and Locklands made me tear up several times, including in its acknowledgement. Robert Jackson Bennett has a truly incredible mind for character, worldbuilding, and fantastical systems, and he inspires with a truly beautiful vision for a brighter future.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Confinement, Suicidal thoughts, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Vomit, Violence, War, Fire/Fire injury, Kidnapping, Slavery, and Torture
jjjreads's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Abandonment, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Slavery, Torture, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Self harm, Terminal illness, Suicide attempt, Child abuse, Confinement, Death of parent, Blood, Body horror, Child death, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, War, Toxic relationship, Trafficking, Violence, Death, Dementia, Domestic abuse, and Drug use
fi_reads_books's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Genocide, Body horror, Blood, Gore, Grief, and Torture
Moderate: Slavery and Abandonment
bamboopanda's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I… can’t even begin to describe my feelings for this book.
Every time I think it has to be ending, has to get better, things get more dire.
This series has made me live and die at the same time. I CANNOT!
But this last book is the one that drove the dagger home.
The despair of it all. The struggle to be the one left standing at the end.
And the heartbreak I experienced at the end of it all.
If not for the fact that I was out in public, I would have cried.
I fear that I’m making no sense, so I will leave it at that.
Every time I think it has to be ending, has to get better, things get more dire.
This series has made me live and die at the same time. I CANNOT!
But this last book is the one that drove the dagger home.
The despair of it all. The struggle to be the one left standing at the end.
And the heartbreak I experienced at the end of it all.
If not for the fact that I was out in public, I would have cried.
I fear that I’m making no sense, so I will leave it at that.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Forced institutionalization, Grief, and Death
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail and Murder
Minor: Violence, Slavery, and War
rinku's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Wow, Locklands was the most disappointing book I’ve read this year. I gave the first books of the Foundryside trilogy five stars without a second thought but everything that made those novels great is gone now which is mainly the result of the eight-year time skip. I was sceptical about this when I heard about it the first time, and sadly, I was right, and it just didn’t work for me.
Eight years are obviously a long time and many things have happened since then and have changed dramatically. Tevanne is destroyed and now the villain who is hunting our main characters. Those are now part of a town consisting of ships named Giva, and the minds of all people living there are connected via scriving. I first found this idea intriguing but became annoyed by it soon since the new characters didn’t really feel like real individuals – which they technically aren’t. The other changes also confused me and lead to most things that I loved about the two first books just being gone, like Tevanne itself or the political intrigue surrounding it. Additionally, I didn’t like the setting with the ship town and the ship fights bored me as well.
The story and the pacing weren’t good as well; there’s way more travelling and planning in general which was sadly often just boring. It almost takes half the book until our character enter the land of the enemy. I hoped that it would become more interesting after this, but it didn’t. Literally 70 % of the book is just spend looking for one (1) door which was just boring. There were also some clichés and predictable things, like the villain trying to reset the world to make a better one, our characters working together with the enemy who’s not so bad after all, and our characters leading the villain to the holy artefact aka the door .
Towards the end, I just wanted to finish this book so I could know how the series would be wrapped up. There were some things about it that I liked, like the way Crasedes backstory was mixed in the final fight or how glitched the world became after the door was opened . Sadly, that was all that I enjoyed about the finale. It was so obvious that Tevanne/Valeria was Clef’s wife. This family drama just took up too much space for my taste .
The rest of the ending honestly just infuriated me mainly because literally every character we followed in the course of the story is gone or dead: Orso, Gregor, Clef, Sancia, and even Berenice – this was so unsatisfying, and I was wondering why I even followed them through over 1500 pages when it was all for nothing. It made me so mad how Berenice didn’t even get the chance to say goodbye to Sancia after she sacrifices herself. Furthermore, the epilogue also made me feel only more miserably since we see how much has changed – for the worse. Berenice can’t be part of any of the hiveminds anymore and this leads to her being completely lonely and even Gregor leaving her which just seems out of character for him. She then goes to Sancia to the parallel world and is hence gone from the world as well which was just depressing. I hated everything about this; yes, Tevanne was irreversibly destroyed and things can’t always the same, but I just wished that we ended like we began book two with our characters having their own trading house and a good time .
The magic system is still one of the most creative I’ve ever seen but this time, there were many things I didn’t really understand. I also missed Tevanne as a setting so much, and new settings couldn’t make up for it, even though they’re creative as well. I just didn’t like the ship town, mainly because I’m personally not very fond of stories taking place mostly on the sea. Other problems I had were not with the writing itself, but the German translation. It had so many mistakes, and there are things mentioned in the synopsis that didn’t even happen in the book.
Another problem I had were with the characters, even though I liked the fact that the cast was still mostly female. This book is mainly told in Berenice’s POV who’s a bit boring. Of course, it is common in fantasy books to use many POVs, but it was just a bit too much for me here, leading to me not really caring for any of the characters. Because of what happened to Sancia in the past, she aged rapidly, and I simply didn’t like this as well. I missed her older snarky self and her talking to objects to manipulate them. Additionally, I missed Gregor and Orso so much.
Writing this review made me a bit sad. I loved the first two books of the Foundryside trilogy so much since it had everything that I love to see in fantasy books: a story mostly happening at one interesting place, a political conflict, a strong and kinda edgy female character and great supporting characters, and a very creative magic system. Those first two books made care for the world and the characters so much. Like I’ve mentioned at many times in my review, this big time skip in Locklands just didn’t work for me because almost all of those things I loved were replaced with things I just don’t like. The ending itself wasn’t satisfying as well, and the characters just deserved better after all the hardships they had to endure. I don’t know if I’ll ever re-read the series since the ending is such a disappointment.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Child death, War, and Child abuse
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail and Violence
Minor: Confinement and Grief
idksamiguess's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and War
Moderate: Slavery, Child death, and Grief
lady_sharp's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I finished this book during a break at work. This turned out to be a mistake. I went through the rest of the day in a haze, hyperaware and not aware at all. I missed a turn driving home but read signs clearer than ever. I realized that finishing this book wasn't enough, I had to tell people about it, how it made me feel, how it made me think. So, here we are.
This is a book about a lot of things. Heists, magic, despair, sacrifice, technology, heroes. But inundated through every thread, poured into every nook and cranny, is what it means to be alone and what it means to be connected. How terrified we are of being alone and how joyful it is to be together and the many obstacles, pains, rewards, and wonders in between How there are some things we can't fight, many things we can, and some that we never needed to fight at all.
The ending is one of the best I've ever read, bringing everything together for sweet and bitter, exploiting its premise to its fullest to tell you about these wonderful characters and how far they've come, about the world they built and we might build too, and about humanity itself. Even though it hurt my heart, I wanted to connect, to be better, to journey forward not as a conquering hero but with all the people I love. I didn't feel the same as I did before I read it, and that is perhaps that best thing a book can do.
It's been a long ride, and I thank the author for taking me on it, and the website for letting me tell it. Love.
This is a book about a lot of things. Heists, magic, despair, sacrifice, technology, heroes. But inundated through every thread, poured into every nook and cranny, is what it means to be alone and what it means to be connected. How terrified we are of being alone and how joyful it is to be together and the many obstacles, pains, rewards, and wonders in between How there are some things we can't fight, many things we can, and some that we never needed to fight at all.
The ending is one of the best I've ever read, bringing everything together for sweet and bitter, exploiting its premise to its fullest to tell you about these wonderful characters and how far they've come, about the world they built and we might build too, and about humanity itself. Even though it hurt my heart, I wanted to connect, to be better, to journey forward not as a conquering hero but with all the people I love. I didn't feel the same as I did before I read it, and that is perhaps that best thing a book can do.
It's been a long ride, and I thank the author for taking me on it, and the website for letting me tell it. Love.
Content Warnings
Graphic: War, Colonisation, Slavery, Abandonment, and Suicidal thoughts
Moderate: Grief, Mental illness, and Blood