OVERALL
3/10
VERDICT
An underwhelming finale with too many convenient solutions.
SYNOPSIS
Send Me Their Souls is the final book of the Bring Me Their Heart series.
Varia wreaks havoc with her uncontrolled power, and it is up to Zera and the gang to stop her before she destroys the whole world. Lucien is a witch now too, but he takes advantage of his powers too much and ends up falling asleep a lot.
SOME INFO
Author: Sara Wolf
Genre: Fantasy
Year of Publication: 2020
WHAT’S GOOD
Lucien continues to be a prince who places his people above all. Well, except for all those times when he refuses to put Zera in danger knowing full well that “danger” means nothing to her immortal body. But considering how he suffers the consequences of over-using his magic and learns his lesson by and by, I’ll let it pass.
Zera and Lucien as a couple? Yes, they’re all right.
They are not a good thing about this book, but objectively, I can’t put them in the Bad category.
Zera and Lucien get over their conflict about Lucien’s lies in the second book in two pages and become a full-fledged couple between whom there are nothing but love and honesty. There is no more tension, they are not as interesting as in the first two books, but they don’t bother you that much.
Evlorasin the giant worm – it’s nice to Zera, has great power and can fly, which just totally reminds me of Heimlich from A Bug’s Life.
Tell me I’m wrong.
NOT SO GOOD
All right, here’s my list of complaints:
*Spoilers from this point on.
For the most part, the writing of this book reads like an emo teenager’s diary is too modern. It gets to a point where everybody acts and speaks as if they were in a sitcom. When Malachite finds out about Lucien and Zera’s engagement, for example:
Malachite makes a sputtering noise behind me.
Oops.
“E-Engaged? SINCE WHEN?”
“Keep your voice down!” Yorl hisses at Mal. “Lest you start a rockslide!”
“Being buried under a rockslide would be preferable to listening to him chew me out for the next seventeen months.”
“Months?” Malachite chokes out. “Try YEARS! Decades! I can’t believe you two are so thickheaded! Who gets married in a time like this? Who even proposes! What do you even eat at a stupid upworlder’s wedding?”
As you can see, Yorl is the only one who still talks like he belongs to this medieval setting.
Next.
The story doesn’t spend enough time with world-building. The concept of this world is great, but the characters only spend a small amount of time at each location before they fly to the next. What we get about each place and its culture is more like expositions than world-building.
Varia is pretty much useless. This is a pity because she is such a promising character in Find Me Their Bones. But the second she is possessed by the Bone Tree, Varia loses her mind completely and just does whatever she’s controlled to do without offering any more interesting development. There’s no struggle, no fighting back, she is just “evil” now.
Malachite. Oh my god, Malachite.
First of all, it’s the way he talks in this book. This has got to be what drags the book’s quality down the most. Sure, Mal (not Oretsev) has always been more casual and laid-back than the rest of the characters, but things like “gonna”, “wanna”, “whadyya know” and so on? He was never this casual and modern in the first two books.
Secondly, Mal and Zera’s endless quipping is … well, endless. It’s fun for a while, but the whole world is repeatedly said to be in danger, you know? So maybe tone it down a bit?
Thirdly, Mal really has no reason to pick fights with Yorl, but he does anyway. Yorl is proud of his education and likes to give more information than necessary, sure, but nothing he ever says warrants the rude remarks from Malachite. These exchanges are probably meant to create tension and serve as a shortcut to friendship for these two. Not sure they work, though.
There is no way Lucien could have reformed the kingdom to the way it is in the end in three years. It’s a bit far-fetched.
How in the name of all magical trees does Zera come back in the end? First of all, she should not have come back to begin with. Really. Through all three books, Zera struggles to choose between her own life and the lives of others, making a lot of morally questionable choices along the way. In the end, she sacrifices her life – which she has only gotten back – so everyone else could live. Bringing her back undermines this development.
And if she does return from the dead, maybe… tell us how?
“I remember that you love me”, Zera to Lucien, is all the explanation we get.
And speaking of explanations…
How do Fione and Varia get their baby when they are both biologically female? No, they didn’t adopt the kid, the book specifically says that Fione becomes pregnant during the three years Zera is away. There’s no indication that Varia is trans; and if they use magic, then some elaboration would be appreciated since this magic has never been discussed before.
If we’re going to argue that this is like Thumbelina, that kids can pop out from tulips and corns if you make the gods happy enough, I would still love some elaboration. Because even Thumbelina is a special case in her world.
BOTTOM LINE
If you have made it this far into the series, it wouldn’t hurt to read this third book. But you might just end up with even more questions than at the end of book 2.