Earth's End (Air Awakens, #3)

by Elise Kova

A woman awoken in air, a soldier forged by fire, a weapon risen from blood.

Vhalla Yarl has made it to the warfront in the North. Forged by blood and fire, she has steeled her heart for the final battle of the Solaris Empire’s conquest. The choices before Vhalla are no longer servitude or freedom, they are servitude or death. The stakes have never been higher as the Emperor maintains his iron grip on her fate, holding everything Vhalla still has left to lose in the balance.

• ISBN10: 1619844222
• ISBN13: 9781619844223
• Publish Date: 11 February 2016
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Price World Publishing
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 316
• Language: English

Reviews

[ladygrey]

So this book is kind of a mess. The title barely has anything to do with the story, but that's not that big of a deal.

I didn't like the beginning so much with Vhalla on her own. But Jax is a fun character with his mood swings and irreverence. He does a lot of the heavy lifting to keep things interesting.

Through the middle, the progression of relationships Aldrik and Baldair as well as Vhalla with Elicia, with Daniel, with even Jax make the middle work. The arguments for war and the morality of that felt weak and from that off-tone viewpoint all the books have. But that's manageable. There are thick descriptions in some places that were easy to skip over, which makes it easy but not good. 

The axe is stupid because it’s obvious where its hidden and its obvious she makes a terrible mistake. Like the kind of mistake people make memes out of where a big epic voice says, “Don’t do it. That's a bad idea!” and the hero says, “eh they probably don't mean it” and does it anyway. Like literally that stupid.

But the worst of it all is the ending.  Well, Aldrik and the ending. In the first book Aldrik is all strong and interesting. In this book he's reduced to being the story's whipping boy. First there's the struggle with alcohol that comes out of nowhere and then vanishes in a day. 

Then the end is completely emotionally erratic for no reason, or for badly explained reasons. She knows Aldrik is lashing out and lying and yet she still takes it to heart and lashes back even harder? Then in the midst of this ridiculous fight she realizes he's this poor broken man that only she can fix? And the only way to fix him is to walk away without context or explanation? And Vhalla is sick of all the lies but im struggling to remember and lies she told or was given other than that stint with the doppelgängers. Then on top of all that everyone suddenly seems him as abusive because she got into the middle of a fight. She tells them how it really happened and they still see it as something else. The characterizations that come out of nowhere just for the sake of conflict are annoying. Plus! Plus now this twenty-five year old prince is engaged to a fifteen year old girl like that’s somehow ok.

Also, no matter how much everyone praises her for being amazing, she's still a stupid girl. She's stupid if she thinks Victor can be trusted with the axe. I think I’m only continuing to read to get to the moment where she is forced to realize how stupid she is but I sadly have little hope for Aldrik in the coming books.

[Mad Soul Child]

Вот ну все хорошо, кроме сцены ссоры в конце, это была какая то херня непонятная

[Vicki]

Vhalla has come a long way. She's no longer the timid library apprentice and has developed confidence in herself and abilities. She was totally kick-ass in those fight scenes. I also really loved how Vhalla and Aldrik's relationship has progressed. They've both owned up to their feelings and committed to each other despite the odds. I love seeing them together. Plenty of action in this one too...especially the end. And that ending....

[Leigha]

A young woman transforms from a library apprentice to a sorcerer in this awesome new adult romance-fantasy series.

I devoured the Air Awakens series over a week. Five books in one week! I’ve owned the first one for ages, finally sitting down to read it this past July. While the beginning is BEYOND slow, the rest of the series more than makes up for the start. Vhalla and Aldrick are – how should we put it? – not terribly interesting in the start of the series. Vhalla is your typical “good girl” and Aldrick your typical “bad boy” archetypes. It’s not until they begin growing, both as individuals and as a couple, I found myself invested in their story. Their transformation during the series is dramatic and earned.

Secondary characters are well-developed, particularly those characters involved in multiple novels. I’d be cautious at giving my heart to any of the characters. All of them – including our leads – are placed in perilous situations throughout the series. Sometimes characters survive with emotional and physical scars, while others meet a grisly fate. *tears* Creating a series with life or death stakes requires, well, life and death stakes. I appreciate the authenticity Ms. Kova cultivates by creating a series where beloved character can, and do, die.

The world building is top notch. The magic system is comprised of elemental magic – air, water, fire, and earth (very similar to The Last Airbender anime). Each region of the continent maintains its own nuances as do the people from those regions. Events in the books build until the dramatic conclusion. While I bought each book separately, I highly recommend purchasing the complete series on Amazon. Trust me – you will want to read them all!

tl;dr Fantastic world building, epic romance, and earned character development makes this life-and-death series a must read.

[Chelsea]

What I Loved

This series just keeps getting more and more intense and it’s getting extremely hard to hold my feelings in. Thankfully I have a couple friends who have also read this series that I can rant to. That’s my favourite part about this series though! You feel so many different things during the course of the whole book! It’s a wonderful feeling! Except when the authors rips out your heart and sets in on fire. Those aren’t fun feelings, but apparently the author has no problems doing that.

If you’ve read up until this book you’ll know that a big part of the plot is that the emperor has a pretty tight leash on Vhalla and is always threatening death. It wasn’t until this book that I really felt that she could die. This author just feels like she would consider killing off the main character. Maybe it’s because she seems to have no mercy towards her other characters but the feeling is there. This only made me love the book more because I honestly have no clue what’s going to happen at any point in time while reading this book. Vhalla could get run over by a stampede of elephants and it wouldn’t surprise me because crazy things just happen in this book. It’s amazing.

What I Didn't Love

The world building that I was kind of complaining about in the previous books was much better in this one. It helped that we actually get to see a lot of the world ourselves now that our characters are travelling. My one complaint in this book would be that the plot wasn’t as exciting as the others. That’s ok for me though because I think this book had some set up for the next ones and it wasn’t a bad plot at all, just not as intense as I was expecting.

Who I'd Recommend To

I’d recommend this to any YA fantasy lover who loves rich characters. In a lot of fantasy it’s the world building that really hooks you into a book but for this series it’s the characters. They feel like your best friends and when one of them dies (which has been known to happen in this series) then you really feel it. It’s also a really great series for emotional readers because this book hits you hard in the feels every chapter.

[shannonmiz]

This review was originally posted on It Starts at Midnight
I'll start by saying that I have literally not a bad thing to say about this book. Like, I actually tried to think of something I didn't like, and I came up empty. I read Earth's End in what felt like minutes. When I finally finished, it was 6am, my heart was in my damn throat, and I am pretty sure I will never recover. You want feels? You'll get them. You want tense, edge of your seat moments? You'll get them too. Want some lighthearted interactions to break up the hell of war? Done. You want the most swoon-worthy romance ever? Hell yes, this book has it in spades.

So you want to know why Earth's End, the third (and middle!) book delivers, somehow even more than the last two, which I seriously did not think possible? Of course you do.

• Vhalla is stronger than ever, but she's still the Vhalla we fell in love with. It's not spoilery to say that she is a Windwalker, and with that comes a lot of power. And she's been through a lot in these three books. So it stands to reason that she is getting to be one hell of a strong woman. But even though she's becoming tougher, more sure of herself, there are still incredibly vulnerable moments that take us back to Vhalla on the first page of the series. So there's tons of growth, but it's not only realistic, it's keeping in line with who Vhalla is as a person.


• The relationship is so beautiful, but so real. So many times in fantasy books, the relationships never have to deal with any "real world" problems, mostly because they aren't happening in the real world. But with this relationship, it feels epic and amazing, but it also feels very, very relatable. Sure, their problems aren't going to be the same as yours or mine, but they struggle to find balance with "work", with family and friends, with communication- all the things that a normal couple would have issues with. Only, they're in the midst of a war and have special abilities and are the most amazing OTP in the history of ever. It's kind of amazing that the author is able to achieve this balance, and it makes the romance even more appealing.


• It's absolutely morally complex. Nothing is black or white, right or wrong. There's an incredible moment where Vhalla realizes that war has two sides- and how easy it is to overlook that the other side is essentially made up of citizens just trying to live their lives too. That's one small example (for the sake of non-spoiler-ness), but it's things like that that make this series incredibly thought provoking. When these things play out on the pages, it has a profound impact on the characters, and certainly made me stop and think.


• The side characters are fabulous- both the existing ones, and the new ones. We're introduced to some new characters that are really enjoyable, and are provided some great moments by those that have already been featured. Some of the characters bring humor, some bring insight, some bring loyalty, and of course, some bring general evilness, but they all bring something to the table. There are no "filler" characters here, they all mean something to the story, and have personalities that pop off the page.


• This series may destroy me. I have fallen in love with so many of the characters, and I have had my feelings yanked all over the place throughout the series, and this book was definitely no different. I experienced tension, joy, laughter,  love, fear, and yes, a certain amount of ugly crying and crushing of my soul, but I feel that's the mark of a really incredible reading experience, so it's a huge positive.

Bottom Line: What more can I say? Elise Kova has somehow done it again, and written a book even stronger than the first two, because apparently she also has magical abilities. In seriousness, I have fallen so in love with this series, and I am blown away by this series' ability to reel me and never let go.  I simultaneously can't wait to find out what happens next while never, ever wanting it to end. But let's be real- Water's Wrath can't get here soon enough!