Darkest mercy is the final installment in the Wicked Lovely series.  Possible spoiler alert – if you have not read the other books in the series (btw why not?) this may contain spoilers for you.

This book picks up from where Radiant Shadows left off. There is a lot more going on in this novel as many strands are pulled together for the conclusion. Keenan has been missing from his Summer court for months and Ash is ruling the court alone, filled with self doubt and anxiety over her decisions. Without it’s two regents being in harmony the court is weaker than it should be and with Bananach doing everything she can to provoke a declaration of war this is an uncertain time for the Summer fey. Donnia is also missing Keenan but has resolved to stay strong for the Winter court. She is becoming increasingly concerned over news of the Dark court and it’s recent conflict with Chaos, particularly as Seth is missing, as is the veil to faery, and rumour has it that Irial has been badly hurt.  This final episode brings lots of the characters previously exlored back into the fray – it does leave some of them out but that is because their story has been resolved to a certain extent.

I really enjoyed this book and think MM has done a fantastic job of resolving the situation between Donnia, Keenan, Seth and Ash. To be honest I couldn’t see how this was going to be achieved but with the introduction of a few twists I think it has worked really well. I also thought that the conflict at the end was very well done and I enjoyed the introduction of a couple of new fey – but I won’t say anything more because I don’t want to spoil this element.

Obviously ending a series is always difficult and it probably isn’t possible to please everybody because we all have our favourites after all!  In that respect I must confess that Radiant Shadows was my personal favourite because I loved the romance between Devlin and Ani. But, I think this ending works well and is the best possible scenario because it allows the characters to stay true to their feelings.

On the whole I think this has been a brilliant series that I would certainly recommend for any readers who like to read about fey.

I suppose if I had any criticisms they would be that things worked out too nicely – but you can’t really grumble about that can you?? And, of course, this was the last book which is very sad ;(

I could definitely read more – but all good things most come to an end I suppose.  Thanks to MM for a very entertaining series.

Rating A+

Darkest Mercy