Strange and Ever After (Something Strange and Deadly Trilogy, #3)

by Susan Dennard

[ladygrey]

I was all ready to vent about the things I didn't like about this book, the things that were just ok, about what a stupid girl Eleanor was or how completely odd and out of the blue other things were. But then it ended very well.

And I like Susan Dennard quite a bit. Her blog is interesting and she has a lot of fun things to say and interesting ways to say them. So I was I bit disappointed that I didn't entirely love these books. There were a few things that should have clued me in, primarily the writing of her contemporaries and friends. But that aside, I still wanted to love it. And I ended up barely liking most of it. The covers are gorgeous! But I never felt emotionally invested in anything. It took three books (two for Oliver - he had such life compared to the others) to connect with the characters. The second and third books labored under the lack of motivations from the first. Reactions and emotions seemed to sometimes come out of nowhere and with no explanation. And even in the third book so many of Eleanor's thoughts and actions didn't make any sense to me. So as much action as there was, I found it a hard series to connect to.

And Dennard did something very bold in the end. Something unexpected and not only did she admirably commit to the choice, she handled it very well. The choice itself did not move me as perhaps it might have. But the aftermath resonated.

There have been a number of books that I like quite a bit until the end ruins them. Rarely does a book salvage itself in the ending, and this one does so quite well.