My Five Word TL:DR Review : It Can’t Possibly End Here?

Well, I’ve just finished the final instalment of the Wolf Den Trilogy and Amara’s story.   Although, clearly, given the ending, I’m thinking that the author may return to the series (or perhaps start a new series from the same period but from a different perspective – I certainly hope so and have my fingers crossed for such an outcome).  What I will say straight away is that if you’ve been enjoying this series I think you’ll be very happy with this final episode.  I don’t want to give away spoilers so I’ll avoid saying anything too revealing but this is a series that I’ve thoroughly enjoyed from start to finish.

What a journey Elodie Harper has taken us on here, every book has contained different aspects from the tense start in the infamous Wolf’s Den where we first met Amara to her precarious rise in fortune that eventually sees her escape the Den to this final episode where she has become established as a courtesan in Rome with an influential patron.  Of course, even with a wealthy patron and improved situation Amara misses her friends and family and Rome is not a place without it’s own convoluted politics and backstabbers so nothing can ever really be taken for granted.

Now, I don’t think it’s a spoiler if I mention here a certain historic event, that I think most people are aware of and that plays a large part, unsurprisingly, in this final chapter.  Yes, Vesuvius and it’s fatal eruption that completely wiped Pompeii off the face of the map. To be fair, I thought this would play a large role in the final instalment and in fact it does, and I will say it makes for riveting reading, even though you’re aware of how this disaster eventually played out it’s absolutely compelling.   I was hooked.

I love the way this series has been written.  There’s a strong focus on female friendships and found family and although parts of the story will make you gasp out loud at the terrible misfortune that some of these people find themselves in there are no gratuitous scenes.  The writing is a perfect combination of real events and people combined with fictional characters and a very easy to read style that I think struck the perfect balance.  When I’m reading a story set in a different period I don’t expect the author to stick pedantically to speech patterns from way back when but at the same time I find it very grating when people use modern phrases, it just pulls me out of the story and I find it frustrating.  Fortunately, that isn’t the case here at all and there’s also a great balance between details and back stories without any purple prose or info dumps.

Overall, I think this is one of my favourite series for a long while.  It’s just a wonderful story of love and hope, persistence against the odds all set within a fascinating period of history.  I loved this final episode and I’m keeping this review fairly short because I really don’t want to give too much away and spoil the conclusion for others, not because I don’t want to gush uncontrollably.

I received a copy through Netgalley,courtesy of the publisher, for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.

My rating 5 of 5 stars.