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A review by rashthedoctor
The Price of Spring by Daniel Abraham
5.0
Here ends the Long Price quartet and despite somewhat lukewarm reviews on goodreads , I found the series thoroughly enjoying and this highly anticipated final book didn’t let me down one bit
What I liked :
I shall start with a quick line or two detailing the consistently delivered goods in this series, that were once again present in this book , i.e , the writing is crisp and every detail is made important which makes the reading experience vivid , the world is fantastically expanded upon but not so much as to bore or overwhelm the reader , the plot setting & magic system remains unique for any fantasy book series I have ever read and the pacing of the story remains apt till the end .
In this book , the characters are what truly impress me . As is now traditional in this series the book starts with another time-jump and ergo our lead characters Otah , former Khai and now Emperor , and Maati , former poet in training , former friend , now enemy and New Dai-kho are old and their characters have developed big time , with Otah becoming wiser but unnecessarily guilt ridden , and Maati becoming toxic and hateful .
Along with these two we see Danat and Eiah grown up and taking two different course in their lives and then there are plenty of new characters and for the first time ever a Proper villain. What I mean is , the previous books did provide antagonists but they were all very well explained and you could understand their motivations and in some cases even relate to them . This book’s villain is also worth sympathy, but the actions committed this time cross a clear boundary that makes the character become a proper Black character with no room left from any grey .
The book uses characters and tropes like most fantasy book right from the first book of the series but breaks these tropes and goes away from the usual course that's followed in most fantasies . Many details are foreshadowed big time to become extremely relevant later on in this book , like the system of hand gestures being used as accessories for communications which becomes extremely important when people start going blind in this series .
This book was strangely very emotional as well, especially the epilogue that really touched me and may have bought some tears in my eyes. For all the merits that this series has had , emotional element was always lacking so far and it was nice to see the author address that this time .
What I didn’t Like :
Unfortunately unlike the previous books this book didn’t work hard in world exploration or had any big battles that are worthy of a series finale and when you compare this book to it’s immediate predecessor that becomes a big deal. In fact , arguably the finale was way too simplistic and somewhat underwhelming . However the sense of underwhelm is not lasting as the epilogue delivers enough punch to leave the readers satisfied.
I can also understand that many readers have taken issues with how one character in particular has changed in status quo , if you had said character as your favorite from the first book in the series than this could very well be a turn off .
Conclusions
A well written and well thought out fantasy series , that truly felt unique in it’s premise and delivery . It’s strange to see the series not being received with enough adoration on Goodreads but if you can trust my taste , I will definitely urge you to give this series a try and if by the end of the 2nd book , you feel differently to my views , than I’d be truly sorry but as of now , I’m fully confidence in my endorsement of this series .