For the first time in its history, Tevenar is at war. The Matriarch of Ramunna, furious with the wizards she believes betrayed her, has sent the Armada to conquer and destroy. Armed with a secret weapon that makes them the unchallenged terror of the seas, the ships of the Armada descend on vulnerable Tevenar.
Elkan and Josiah, along with the rest of the Wizard’s Guild, scramble to rally the … rally the people of Tevenar to defend their home. The Mother’s power gives them a chance to stand against their foes, but alone it’s not enough. To defeat the Ramunnans, they must find a way to duplicate their enemies’ weapons. Josiah believes they can, because they’ve encountered a similar explosive before. But only one person in Tevenar knows how to make and use the deadly blasting powder—Meira, the woman Elkan once loved and rejected.
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This fourth and final book in The Chronicles of Tevenar was superb. All the familiar characters played parts in the war that was the focus of over half the book. Ramunna’s armada filled Tevenar’s harbor as did the war ships of Marrana. Finally the ships carrying the Faithful arrived. Once again Elkan, now the Guildmaster for the wizards, had to deal with multiple crises at the same time. Josiah’s crackpot ideas once again saved the day. Despite the dark subject matter of war and betrayal, the book is not dark. The characters work past difficulties and find a degree of contentment. This is a series I’d highly recommend despite the disappointing focus on religion in book three.
Ugh. Had to finish the series to see if it got back on track after the bloated mess of the 3rd book. *Spoiler alert* It did not. The first book had such potential! By the 3rd the characters and plot were lost in a morass of religions, 2 of which were as simplistically drawn as the villainous characters in each book: single note evil bullies spewing venom, hatred, intolerance and cruelty with no real understanding of how they got that way or what perpetuated them. The plot ideas across the 4 book series were interesting but the utter lack of character development, motivations, foreshadowing or any other writing skill to move through the story leaves the plot events hanging by their individual threads and unconnected into an actual story. Even the primary character Josiah was penciled in to become an inventor at the end so 3 books worth of telling us he had a ‘wizard’s heart’ was all for nothing. This was minor compared to most of the other characters. While the author has a good ear for conversations, the lack of basic understanding about people and motivations and development chronically hampered the series. The worst case: a 16 year old girl who apparently has Stockholm syndrome that never gets addressed. She doesn not learn, grow, or change in any substantial way over the 4 books, in spite of a myriad of interventions and offers from other characters with the means and intentions to better her life. Somehow she still (unrealistically and unreasonably) gets to hang with a queen and be adopted by a cult leader. She lies, concocts elaborate conflicting stories and creates harmful situations…in all 4 books. The ‘good’ characters eventually discover these lies, betrayals, and harmful events set into motion…some in each book, and all by the 4th book…and yet, in spite of these confrontations and interventions, she persists, and they persist in hoping for good to happen – right up to the bitter end for Josiah. AND even at that point, the author writes her a redemption arc where she gets to see god and become a prophet welcomed back into the fold. Did I mention she was 16 and completely lacking in any moral or ethical integrity? By halfway through the final book I was just racing through it to get to the end to see what the author was deciding to do with the characters…there was no writing to enjoy and such dislike of characters that it was a struggle to finish.