With how the second book ended on a rather surprising cliffhanger, I couldn’t help but wonder how Armstrong would continue the story in book 3 and end her trilogy. In a sense, the cliffhanger worked as it grabbed my attention since I needed to know what happened next. But that also created higher expectations as to what happens next. Part of that expectation may have been the problem with how Forest of Ruins actually played out.
Character Development
7/10
The interesting thing about the transition from Empire of Night to Forest of Ruin is the change of who felt like the main characters. While Ashyn and Moria are both the point of view characters, only one of them felt like they were one of the main characters of the story despite her belief that no one pays attention to her role. Moria went from being a strong-willed character with agency and determination to someone akin more to a supporting character instead. Instead of her, the focus seemed to go mainly on Gavril as the main character of that story arc with Moria and Tyrus as the supporting characters. Gavril did have a very interesting character arc and truly could have been a compelling character had the previous book also chose to focus on him as a core character to focus on developing across the series. It was a strange choice after cementing Ashyn and Moria as the main characters in Sea of Shadows and Empire of Night.
While Moria as a character felt rather static in her role, Ashyn was surprisingly complex, endearing and engaging as a character. Across the series we’ve seen her grow from a timid, shy and quiet girl to one who has more of a solemn strength to her. Life may not be fair and in times quite cruel, but she has grown to be quite mature and intelligent. The way she maneuvers through her challenges and carefully considers what has happened and who she’s met, it shows just how much she’s developed into a strong character. It’s often quite difficult to create a strong character that isn’t just someone who will jump into the fray and fight for what they believe and Ashyn is a perfect example of how to write one well. It’s just a pity she didn’t get more time to shine in the story.
Plot
6/10
There’s something to be said about a story that’s unpredictable. Even when said story flows well and subverts our expectations, there is something to be said about going in a seemingly wild direction away from what was laid out. It certainly didn’t help that the central antagonist of the series rarely makes an appearance and his influence is almost entirely heresay and through others. His lack of appearance makes for an anticipated encounter that never quite manifests the way it should when it finally happens. Perhaps because the slow build up that Forest of Ruin had leading into an unexpected confrontation that seemingly came out of nowhere made what should have been an exciting climax into a rather odd moment. The ending leaves more questions than answers that felt rather disappointing. It was especially strange as a major part of the story that seemed important didn’t end up mattering in the overall story. It was very confusing.
Worldbuilding
5/10
It was as apparent in Empire of Night but the lack of clarity of the distances within this world made a lot of moments in Forest of Ruin very confusing. It was hard to gauge how far distances were as it seemed like characters were almost teleporting from place to place as the plot demanded. It lead to a lot of confusion as the first book, Sea of Shadows, was very deliberate in emphasizing distance whereas Forest of Ruin didn’t seem to factor that in. It was certainly a problem in the previous book, but in this book it’s far more confusing, especially when it came to the climax.
That being said, the magic system was also rather confusing. As far as soft magic systems go, this one seemed to be the least present but also the least explained. Typically there’s some understanding of how magic works given or how it’s used but there was a distinct lack ofexplanation as to how a lot of the magical creatures came to be. There was a grim implication of how they came to be and why Alvar was doing what he did, but by the end of the story it turned out not to be the case. As a result, it seemed rather pointless and an excuse to have the main characters go on the journey. Magic is often a staple in fantasy stories but the author needs to be careful that it doesn’t seem like magic can do whatever the author needs to continue the story without some kind of set up. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case here.
Writing Style
8/10
Something about how Forest of Ruin was written didn’t quite feel as engaging as the previous two books had. The way each chapter was written felt far denser with more exposition which made the flow feel a bit more cumbersome from chapter to chapter. The chapters themselves weren’t too long to be exhausting to read through and Armstrong does a good job with focusing on the emotional state of the characters even if they seem to flip flop rapidly, it still felt believable with the description of emotion and body language. The intense moments were written to be fast and fluid though, adding to the excitement of scene.
Score
6.5/10
Raph's Cozy Musings 