Title: The Raven King

Author: Maggie Stiefvater

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Paranormal

Format: Paperback

Page Count: 438

WARNING: ALTHOUGH THERE AREN’T ANY SPOILERS FOR WHAT HAPPENS IN THIS THIRD INSTALLMENT IN THE SERIES, YOU MIGHT WANT TO READ THE FIRST BOOK BEFORE READING THIS REVIEW.

Synopsis:

The fourth and final installment in the spellbinding series from the irrepressible, #1 New York Times bestselling author Maggie Stiefvater.

All her life, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love’s death. She doesn’t believe in true love and never thought this would be a problem, but as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.

I am an emotional wreck, you guys. Ah, I don’t even know where to start with this book. I don’t know how my words can do this wonderful completion of one of my all-time favorite series justice. I’ll try, nonetheless. But firstly, if you’d like you can read my reviews on the other books in this series!

The Raven Boys|The Dream Thieves|Blue Lily Lily Blue

I am in love with The Raven Boys, ah – they’re amazing, truly. Every single last one of them. They have flaws and they make mistakes and they can sometimes annoy the heck out of me but they’re my raven boys (as well as multiple thousand other reader’s raven boys, but they’re not important).

I was terrified to read this book because I’m an alien to finishing series. I have barely finished any series in my lifetime so finishing this series would be a big deal for me. I wasn’t going to start this book until maybe halfway through the month of May but I couldn’t wait any longer and started it before the end of April because my excitement overthrew my fear.

“What a strange constellation they all were.”

I was expecting so much from this book and I’m glad to say that I wasn’t let down. I mean, not everything I wanted to happen happened but I was overall pretty satisfied by the ending. If I had read this when it was released and hadn’t known about the upcoming Ronan-centered trilogy that Maggie’s intending to write, then I wouldn’t be as okay with this ending as I am.

The characters were explored even more in this book than the past books and they feel like real people I could speak to and touch. I don’t think I’ve felt this way about fictional characters in a book since Harry Potter – and that’s saying a lot!

Blue and Gansey aren’t my favorite of the troupe – and I believe a lot of people feel the same. I liked Blue more in the last book than in this book. I still feel like she doesn’t quite fit with the boys, if you get what I’m saying. It’s not because she’s a girl, but I think it’s just because she’s not as realistic as the raven boys themselves.

Gansey is the golden boy who has a drive to find the sleeping Welsh king, Ronan is a fragile being that hides behind a tough exterior and can dream up anything he desires, Adam is what he secretly desires and is a boy who has felt unloved his entire life by his family, thus being too scared to love himself, and then there’s Noah – the boy who will never get the chance to be anybody besides a boy forever.

Blue, however – I don’t know. She’s a girl who lives with a family of psychics but isn’t a psychic herself and has known her entire life that she will kill her true love if she kisses him. Besides that she is a strong female character, but she’s also not. It’s difficult to explain but when she’s not a strong powerhouse that I love, she’s just irritating. That’s the only two feelings I have with her – go kick that guy’s butt since he catcalled you and ughhhh just stop talking already!

I don’t know if anybody else has these feelings towards Blue but I just much preferred the raven boys over her. Blue just felt like a useless object, I’m sorry but it’s true! She’s not the worst female heroine I’ve read about, thankfully, but she’s also far from being the best. Maybe I’ll grow to like her more in the upcoming Ronan trilogy?

Now, can we all just fangirl together about that kiss? I’m not going to spoil y’all that haven’t yet read the book but that kiss! The first one, not the second one. If you’ve read the book, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

This is what I looked like on the outside when I read it:

Yet, this is how I was on the inside:

Besides the characters, the writing in this book was Maggie’s best thus far. And let me just tell you, there were some gross descriptions in this book. She really went all out there with the descriptions and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like it. Actually, the more disgusting, the more I seemed to love it.

That aside, I was disappointed with ‘the big reveal’ or the ‘climax’. I feel like Maggie rushed the ending a little bit because the book could’ve done with another 20-30 pages to wrap things up nicer, but maybe that’s just me being a greedy reader.

I did want something more at the end, but since there is going to be a Ronan trilogy, I’m completely fine because there is going to be a Ronan trilogy! I can’t express in words how excited I am for this!

Rating: 5 Stars

Although I was a bit disappointed with how some things played out, this was a perfect book to me and I will always and forever love it.

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