A review by amybraunauthor
The Conquering Dark: Crown & Key by Susan Griffith, Clay Griffith

4.0

Actual rating is 3.5! I was super excited about the ending of this trilogy and got exactly what I wanted and expected! Monsters, action, magic, wit, and a little bit of romance! The story was good, with the action taking the characters to various locations and testing the limits of their physical prowess. The characters basically filled their arcs, with Kate and Malcolm being the most prominent figures. As always, the action scenes were long and intense, and nobody walked away unscathed. While I did enjoy this finale and will miss this quirky family, there were some problem I had with it, such as a side character appearing over halfway through the book, only to be extremely important later. Considering her role at the end of the second book, I wish she had been included earlier. But the reason I knocked this rating down a 0.5 was because of the sudden, random twist regarding Simon's father near the very, very end. It was completely out of the blue and didn't make any sense to me. In fact, it was so shocking, that I feel it should have been a core part of the story and overarching series rather than just tacked on at the end. There are also questions that I feel were left unanswered and too ambiguous, but the final chapter seemed fairly solid to me. All in all, the series was a lot of fun and I'm really glad I got to finally read it. Recommended for anyone who's looking for a fun, easy read this summer!