Jan 19

Jan 19 A Sky Beyond the Storm (Ember Quartet, #4)

Author: Sabaa Tahir
Publisher: Razorbill
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

Click above to buy this book from my Bookshop.org shop, which supports independent bookstores (not Amazon). You can also find it via your favorite indie bookstore here.

Note: Trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

***Description is spoiler for An Ember in the Ashes, A Torch Against the Night, and A Reaper at the Gates***

Prepare for the jaw-dropping finale to the beloved New York Times bestselling series.

The long-imprisoned jinn are on the attack, wreaking bloody havoc in villages and cities alike. But for the Nightbringer, vengeance on his human foes is just the beginning.

By his side, Commandant Keris Veturia declares herself Empress and calls for the heads of any and all who defy her rule. At the top of the list? The Blood Shrike and her remaining family.

Laia of Serra, now allied with the Blood Shrike, struggles to recover from the loss of the two people most important to her. Determined to stop the approaching apocalypse, she throws herself into the destruction of the Nightbringer. In the process, she awakens an ancient power that could lead her to victory—or to an unimaginable doom.

And deep in the Waiting Place, the Soul Catcher seeks only to forget the life—and love—he left behind. Yet doing so means ignoring the trail of murder left by the Nightbringer and his jinn. To uphold his oath and protect the human world from the supernatural, the Soul Catcher must look beyond the borders of his own land. He must take on a mission that could save—or destroy—all that he knows.

TL;DR Review

A Sky Beyond the Storm is absolutely everything I hoped it would be and more. An incredible conclusion to what’s now solidified as an all-time favorite series.

For you if: You have ever loved a fantasy book! (And you read the first three already lol.)

Full Review

Hello, my name is Deedi and I am a RAGING PASSIONATE MESS. (In a good way.) And I finished the book a week and a half before writing this review, lol. There’s only one way to describe this series: a plot and character masterpiece. I don’t say that lightly. It’s truly one of the best series I have ever read.

I first read books 1–3 of the Ember Quartet in 2018. I reread them over the past two months, alongside a few bookworm friends, to prep for the launch of Sky. And first of all, let me just say that rereading these books was an absolutely incredible experience. I actually don’t think you can get a full appreciation of how carefully and lovingly plotted these books are on a first read. As you reread, you pick up on things that you never would have noticed or understood the first time around. The number of times I texted my friends with exclamatory moments of awe re: a moment of foreshadowing was … a lot. Now that I know that and I’ve read the last one, I feel like I need to reread them all again just so that I can get the full effect.

So to say that I had high expectations for this book is a massive understatement. I was secretly nervous that there was no way it would be able to live up. But friends, we are now unsurprised that live up it did, and more. WHAT A FREAKIN ENDING. I took notes and jotted down theories and reactions as I read, and there are so many all-caps sentences, photos of quotes, moments of joy and sadness, awe and rage and love and WOW. I cried very hard, both in grief and in happiness. Sabaa I can’t say too much here because I’m not about the spoilers life, but wow.

All I can really say is that whenever someone asks me for a fantasy series recommendation in the future, this one is going to be the very first one I mention. Probably forever. Read it. Kthxbye.

UGH.