A review by ramunepocky
Greywaren by Maggie Stiefvater

2.5

 

I enjoyed this book so much more than Mister Impossible. Which is a plus, but I also don’t think it would have been hard. I started this book thinking that maybe it would pick back up entirely, and I’d end up giving this book 5*s. And then she went and ruined it entirely and I spent the last third of this book so angry and annoyed because talk about the biggest cop out ever. 

Oh yeah, Ronan is a dream. A dream of two people and a forest. And then they couldn’t live with what they’d created and kept him primarily for Declan because Declan was already attached/protective of him. Y'know, the Declan that Ronan never felt like was a brother, to the extent he dreamed Matthew. Oh sure. That makes sense. That checks out with every other bit of lore written before. I liked it so much more when Greywaren meant that he’d helped manifest Cabeswater, not oh, you’re essentially a personification of the forest and ley line. It also irritated me the way she tried to change the lore like the night wash had always been present even in childhood and that’s why Ronan could never leave the Barnes for long. Like he didn’t not live there for like a year. On a sleeping weak ley line until Adam woke it up. But sure. Sure. Makes so much sense. And it clearly wasn’t already planned out when TRC was being written because the threads that had been left there, the Camaro wheel, the hint at other things that could be coming, those threads were all just abandoned. Nothing we see hinted at in TRC is continued in TDT. We see Gansey, Blue and Henry for two seconds in the epilogue, FOUR YEARS LATER. And that’s it. 

And honestly, the entire of the rest of this book was overshadowed for me and ruined by this because I struggled to find any other positives. And Ronan was asleep for like 90% of the book. Declan was the leading character and him and Jordan are the only ones who had any character substance or development this entire trilogy. 

I also don’t think the final boss villain made any sense. He appeared right at the end, but also, there had been no sign or foreshadowing or hints that he would be the one. He just came out of nowhere, did essentially jack shit except capturing Jordan and Adam to try and force Ronan and Hennessy’s hands and then what??? Got stopped almost immediately when they all dream bc Hennessy isn’t actually afraid of the Lace anymore and he'd been counting on her bringing it back. Wow. Good job. So much thought out. All the good thinking. Wow. 

The only thing I’ll actually take from this book is this one quote about Ronan and that is it, thanks. 

“Look how lovingly tattooed his skin was, each mark a small confirmation that even though it felt like he hated his life and his body, deep down, he wanted to keep it, to redecorate the place to his own liking.”