Gold Star Review: Fox Forever

Fox Forever
by Mary E. Pearson
The Jenna Fox Chronicles, book three

Locke Jenkins has some catching up to do. After spending 260 years as a disembodied mind in a little black box, he has a perfect new body. But before he can move on with his unexpected new life, he’ll have to return the Favor he accepted from the shadowy resistance group known as the Network.

Locke must infiltrate the home of a government official by gaining the trust of his daughter, seventeen-year-old Raine, and he soon finds himself pulled deep into the world of the resistance—and into Raine’s life. (description from Amazon.com)

What an amazing end to the trilogy.  I've loved Jenna Fox's story from the start...(check out my review for book two, The Fox Inheritance, here) and Pearson ended Jenna and Locke's story masterfully.  The entire series has been thought-provoking, emotionally intense, and impossible to put down.  The final book lived up to its predecessors without fail.  Locke's journey was both exciting and introspective.  It's sort of impossible to thoroughly review this book without giving spoilers for books one and two, but I do need to say that the bad guys get their due, Locke finds the love he truly needed, and Jenna finally finds the closure that her life had been lacking.  All around an amazing story and Pearson deserves a GOLD STAR not only for this book, but for the entire trilogy.  

The only other trilogy that I've read that I feel is as strong as this one is Neal Shusterman's Skinwalker Trilogy. If you haven't read those, go pick up Everlost right now! 

Full disclosure: Audio book received from SLJ for review

Spy Glass

Spy Glass
by Maria V. Snyder
Glass Magic trilogy, book three

After siphoning her own blood magic in the showdown at Hubal, Opal Cowan has lost her powers. She can no longer create glass magic. More, she's immune to the effects of magic. Opal is now an outsider looking in, spying through the glass on those with the powers she once had, powers that make a difference in the world.

Until spying through the glass becomes her new power. Suddenly, the beautiful pieces she makes flash in the presence of magic. And then she discovers that someone has stolen some of her blood—and that finding it might let her regain her powers. Or learn if they're lost forever…

This book is an emotional thrill ride that will suck you in and spit you back out. Opal goes through A LOT in this conclusion to her story, but very similarly to Alanna from Tamora Pierce's The Lionness Quartet, everything that Opal goes through, everything the reader experiences along with her, brings the story to a very satisfying conclusion emotionally.

When Opal finds her true love, it really feels like it's the real deal. Not just happy, superficially perfect, but really, truly, fully-fleshed "I see all your faults and love you anyway" real. *le sigh.

Though none of Snyder's books quite match the ultimate perfection of Poison Study, I love Opal, her brand of magic, and the men in her life. Again, I wish a few of the side characters...hello, Janco!...could get their own stories, but Opal was a strong, realistic heroine that I'll be sorry to leave behind.