Downfall

by Rob Thurman

Reviewed by Coral

Everything seems to be going against the Leandros brothers at the moment. Cal seems to be losing the battle against his Auphe side, Grimm and his children and preparing to either kill Cal or to bring Cal over to their side (Grimm never seems quite sure which option is his preferred), the Vigil have decided that Cal needs to be eliminated after he used his abilities in public and Delilah – after having taken power from the Kin – wants Cal dead as well.

Having watched his friends die too many times before, Robin is determined not to lose them so soon in this lifetime. He will do what it takes to protect his friends, with or without their knowledge.

The last couple of books in this series have been pretty lackluster, so much so that Ruby (who originally bought the series and convinced me to read them) had decided to give up on them all together. I was right there with her as well, not really liking the introduction of the whole reincarnation plot, mainly because it felt like a huge retcon of the Cal, Niko and Robin friendship from the first books. But then I heard that Robin was going to have chapters that were integral to the plot and changed my mind.

I enjoyed this book, although I think that had a lot to do with the Robin chapters.

The one big positive for me in this book were the glimpses into Robin and Niko’s friendship. In book one, Niko turned to Robin when Cal was possessed and then again when Cal went missing with amnesia. Despite this, I’ve thought that the picture we’ve had of their friendship was a little lopsided. I hated that all we ever seemed to get were instances where Niko seemed to be annoyed with Robin. The only exception before this book, if I remember, was when someone was out to kill Robin and Niko said something nice about Robin that I can’t remember. In this book, I liked that Niko said how much Robin meant to him and actually seemed to be genuinely concerned about Robin throughout.

While I still think that introducing the reincarnation aspect this late in the game is a giant retcon of the earlier books, I found myself liking the implications of Cal, Niko and Robin being friends across multiple life times. I liked seeing glimpses into several of their past lives, though I have four small complaints. 1) I can understand why the author wanted Niko to have been famous warriors and generals in the past, but that doesn’t mean I have to like her eliminating the sexual aspect Achilles/Patroclus and Alexander/Hephaestion relationships; 2) I know Robin tends to lie a lot, but in a past book he said Alexander the Great was controlled by Hob, so this is either a mistake, another retcon by the author, or something that needs to be explored more. Niko as Alexander under Hob’s control sounds interesting. 3) Again, since Robin lies it’s hard to know if this is a mistake or just Robin not telling the truth before, but he seemed to catch on to the whole reincarnation of his friends differently than how he previously explained it. 4) Seriously, not one past life where Niko and Robin were lovers? Not one? As maybe the lone Niko and Robin ‘shipper’ out there I am very disappointed.

I haven't really liked how the author has written Niko in the past few books and found myself annoyed again in this one. In what world would Niko really think he could beat Robin in a fight, considering how his fight against Hob went and given that Hob is older? Also, I know how Niko feels about charity, but I doubt he would ever expect to be able to repay Robin for anything given how much money Robin has to spend (and bribing murderous people will probably never be cheap).

Even though they kind of fit with Robin’s plan, some of the tertiary characters that made reappearances seemed a little shoe-horned into the story.

I have no idea what is happening with Promise or Ishiah. Promise was a non-entity in this book, with a crappy excuse given for why she hasn’t been around. She could be an interesting character, but the reasons that have been given for her not being there have kind of made me dislike the character. And, given the nature of her excuses, it's just really hard to care about her relationship with Niko, because I find those excuses make her seem like she doesn't understand or fit with Niko's life at all. Plus, it's hard to believe Niko would just accept any of this; he shouldn't.

I also don’t really understand the direction taken with Ishiah in this book. I freely admit that I don’t like the character because I want Robin and Niko to get together (which I fully realize will never happen) but apart from that, I really don’t see why a certain past action was included if it wasn’t to make people dislike the character. Unless this is a rare secret in a fictional universe that will actually never see the light of day, I just don’t see certain characters forgiving him for this. I don’t think I can.

Grade: B

Ruby's Review

As Coral mentioned I was not interested in reading this book. The repetitive nature and rapidly declining, well everything was aggravating and I walked away. Coral did convince me to give the series once last chance and I have to admit that it was slightly better. Only slightly.

In all honesty I am not as big a Robin fan as Coral is - I found him to be very annoying in certain books - so I didn't enjoy this book as much as she did. The main problem I have with this series is still present. All the books are basically identical to each other except for the secondary plot which always feels tacked on and very contrived. The main plot will always be Cal's internal struggle. I wouldn't mind so much if it wasn't exactly the same as the last book and the one before that one and the one before that one and so on. Not just themes but actual sentences are repeated over and over. They don't vary. It gets to a certain point where I'm thinking why even bother reading it? Why even bother writing it? The only difference with this book is that it is Robin thinking them instead of just Cal. That's not what I call progress. So instead of having Cal whine and bitch all book we get to see the brothers messed up relationship in their past lives.

Gah! The whole reincarnation thing bothered me when it first popped up last book because it came out of freaking nowhere and it still bothers me. Everything about it felt forced and awkward. I personally never got how Niko and Robin were friends since their relationship felt born out of necessity rather then out of any true feelings and this seemed like a band-aid fix as to why they stayed friends even though I was sure Niko wanted Robin dead a few times.

Is it too much to ask for character development? Because not a single a single one of them has grown since book one. And now I find that they have been this way for thousand of years. Please god don't let the author write about those past lives. I don't think I would be able to take it.

Grade: D