This is the end of the Lux series and the fifth book in the series. Which means that this one will also hold my rating for the entire series as well as this book. It was published in 2014 by Entangled Teen and like the other books in the series, it is a Young Adult book with elements of aliens. Yes, we have teenage vampires, werewolves and now aliens. That is what we all needed.
The plot of this book followed the conclusion of the last book with the invasion of the Luxans and Daemon and his family is being trapped by his peoples hive mind while Katy is hiding along with Luc, Archer and a pregnant Bethany. As the world they knew are ending, they will need to fight to keep whatever shiver of life they have alive.
And it all starts with Katy being captured and messing up, again. I have no idea why the author in all of these books keep making Katy get captured and the weak link of the group. Especially when the author keeps suggesting that she is powerful and yes, the villains dies here as well. Armentrout truly likes to kill the villains.
I cannot really say much of the character that haven’t really been said in the previous book reviews. They are the same. This book is not very character driven but is focused on the plot which is only natural since such a large thing is happening. The few character driven moments are often about grief or fear in an emotional scene that often is followed by an action scene like the author is afraid to slow things down.
I don’t really have any overall critic of this book. It was well paced, structured well, emotional and fairly well written. The one thing I felt was underwritten was the leader of the Arum who had from what I can remembered not been mentioned before this book and frankly hadn’t much of a role though he was presented as really powerful. I also dislike when an author creates a threatening person and just pull out, well, he is dangerous because he is crazy. I always feel like it is a bit cheap but I wasn’t too concerned here since the leader of the Arum hasn’t a big role other than to just show up.
Overall, the book was well written and ends the story with me being satisfied. There wasn’t anything surprising here and I felt that some plot points such as Nancy Husher was just unnecessary. I also feel that some characters were under used such as Luc, but still they got a ending like they were a large part of the group. Luc should have been, but he wasn’t that large outside the plot. I don’t really know him, and he wasn’t with the characters for long. He was more there like a plot point than a character. Not that Armentrout didn’t try to give him one but it just fell flat. So I would give this book a 8 out of 10. It was good and I would read it again in the future.
Now, for the entirety of the series. The story is actually good, the characters is a bit shaky sometimes like the author almost forget what their characters was. We still haven’t figured out why Katy had such weird changes in the personality going from kind and sympathetic one second and callous the other. She can become a cold-blooded killer the next. The books series do give some hints that hybrids are mentally unstable but the writer seem to forget this, or didn’t notice that she keep changing Katy’s personality and we don’t get an answer.
I also noticed that she seemed to forget, or consciously ignored, the Luxan power to freeze time. There were several times where I wondered why Daemon just didn’t freeze time and I might suspect that Armentrout pretended that the power didn’t exist since it makes the Luxan overpowered. Though let’s be honest, the Luxan powers are random.
It is stated that they have their power because they are made up of light and all their powers comes from light. Speed of, well not light, but they have enhanced speed. Okay. Blast people with light. Okay. Telepathic gifts… Okay? The power to freeze time. Hold up how does that work? Who knows, even the writer makes a shrug and just say. It just does.
The lore though and the worldbuilding is actually quite good. The Luxan, Arum, hybrids and Origin all get their time in the spotlight. Not all are fully developed but they are not needed to be fully fleshed. Armentrout gives us just the right amount of information to make it interesting. Especially when she adds weaknesses and strengths in the mix ensuring than none of the aliens or the half breeds are to overpowered.
Not all the books were good though, I disliked some of them, such as the second one who had no real goal and made Katy ridiculously stupid. I think it tried to mimic the first book that didn’t really have an obvious plot either but that book was about the characters. We already knew the characters in the second book so it really needed a solid plot. The other books were far better with a more structured plot and end goal.
I also read the Oblivion series along side the three first books and found them to be far better since I liked Daemon more and can actually hold up on their own. By the fourth book and in the fifth one, the two perspectives of Daemon and Katy had joined into one book so there was no reason to have another Oblivion book. Which was most likely easier for the author and frankly, better since it was only the first Oblivion book that truly felt like a new book. The others was too close to the original to be called their own entity.
There were a lot of death in this book series, it actually surprised me. I had thought it would be far more light hearted but the three last books were really dark, especially the last two. Armentrout do not shy away from killing characters, both good and bad. Though I did notice that the main characters and those close to them seemed to be safe.
I also noticed two other things, the first seemed to be the lack of colored characters. Most seemed to be white, and very beautiful. Though to be frank, I might have missed some of the colored people since I don’t think that everyone was given a race but considered that this is United States, I think I shouldn’t have to look for the colored people.
The other thing I noticed is what I often amusingly called the Rowling ending, were everyone needs to get married or/and have children. All of them seemed paired off with each other and only one wasn’t allowed a happy ending with their loved one. But I think the last book pretty much sums that up perfectly, “not everyone gets their happy ending.” It seemed more there to make that point valid and it sticks out like a sore thumb.
If I account for every book including the Oblivion series, I would give the Lux series a rating of 9 out of 10. It has a compelling plot, interesting lore and well written characters. This is a YA series I would warmly recommend for the lovers since it has such a good story and far better writing than other books in the series. I do no regret reading, or to be exact listening to the audiobooks, and I will warmly recommend listening to the audiobooks as well since the narrators do a good job delivering this book.
What did you think about this series? Did you feel like reading it?
With Kind Regards
Senefer.
Read with Senefer 