lost_hitsu 's review for:

Any Way the Wind Blows by Rainbow Rowell

3.0

---

That third star is just for nostalgia's sake. This book feels very much like it started with a list of things to sort out for the protagonists

Spoiler

(Simon and Baz snogging in the catacombs? check. Get Simon a new sword and a long lost granny who loves feeding him? check. No inconveniently incompatible lifespans? check. Pair everyone up neatly? check, I was half expecting Jamie and Pippa to announce their engagement.)

and everything else was then built around it. I love a good satisfying ending, but unfortunately that surrounding plot felt both disjointed and predictable

Spoiler

(I knew it was coming but I still had to stop reading and just stare into the distance for a while when that melodrama with Excalibur started to actually unfold, like the weirdest homage to Oliver Twist and other improbable Dickensian reunions)

. Even that I'd be happy to overlook, but not the fact that I couldn't recognise several of the characters I loved so much in Carry On

Spoiler

(Look I'm as delighted as the next person about a butch lesbian love interest, but nothing about the characterisation of Agatha in CO persuaded me that she could find her happiness as a hermit goatherd at Watford. And Penny - PENNY - ignoring Simon when he's asking her for help for A WEEK so that she can conveniently deal with her demonically engaged boyfriend? Please. I even felt sorry for Daphne and what the story did to her.)

. There were genuinely sweet moments and others that made me laugh, but I can't help but wish these glimpses into Baz and Simon's future were instead turned into vignettes or novellas - or really just left to the reader's imagination.