A Power Unbound

A Power Unbound, by Freya Marske

A very solid end to a great trilogy full of romance, magic, and adventure. A Power Unbound isn't too serious, but is lively and dynamic. Of all the viewpoint characters in this series, I think Jack is my least favorite. Alan is great, though, and his working class roots are a refreshing counterpoint to all the damn landed gentry!

There is one major plot point--which, I guess, spoiler alert, skip this paragraph if you don't want to know things--that I felt like didn't work as well as it could have. When Alan is threatened by the bad guys and forced to betray our heroes, this was kept secret from the reader by putting us in Jack's point of view while it was happening. Jack was clueless, so as a reader the eventual reveal of this really came out of left field. I think it should have been telegraphed more, even if not fully revealed until the appropriate time. There was a lack of build up to the reveal.

But other than that, I really enjoyed the ending on a dramatic adventure level, and appreciated the direction the world ended up going in the conclusion. The democratization of magic fits the setting/era as well as being deeply appealing to me both on a political level and on the level of, like, I want to be able to do magic and obviously wasn't born a magician, so.

This trilogy isn't serious, weighty, work, but it isn't frivolous, either. It's got sex scenes just for fun, but it's also about power and grief and being a human, and while it might not rock your world it will comfort you in the cold night (literally) so, you know. It's lovely.