Book Review - All Spell Breaks Loose by Lisa Shearin

I like it when authors have a set story in mind, but they know it's going to take a number of books to finish the series. Sure, episodic novel series (like Sue Grafton or Janet Evanovich) can be good too. But a lot of times those series start to become stale.

Lisa Shearin is the author of a fantasy series of books about Raine Benares, an Elven Seeker who just happens to have the essence of an incredibly powerful (and not to mention truly evil) ancient stone inhabiting her body. She fights constantly against the evil intelligence to keep it from making her do things to release itself or to feed on the energies of other living beings. Of course, there are forces in the world who want to release that energy or take it over themselves. The only way to do that is to get rid of the current host, unfortunately.

This series is six books long, and I recently finished the last one, All Spell Breaks Loose. I've loved the series even though I missed reading the first and third books in it. It's very well-written with a lot of great dialogue between the various characters, both magical and "mundane" (yes, I've been briefly inhabited by Harry Potter).

What I find best about the series, and this book specifically too, is how Raine is not a perfect character. She will do something and then belatedly realize that maybe that just wasn't the right thing to do. In fact, maybe it was a horribly wrong thing to do, and then she has to deal with the consequences.

So how does this book end the series? Is it on a good note?

I can safely say that yes, it is.

From the review:

"Goblin dark mages have stolen the Saghred. With the power of the stone, the dark mage will be able to take over the world and destroy the Elven race. One thing stands in his way: while Raine is alive, he can't access the stone's power. Solution? Make sure she's not alive. Raine and her friends may be making it easier for him as they undertake a covert mission to the Goblin homeland to destroy the Saghred once and for all. Or die trying."

This is a great series, an excellent final book, and I can't wait to see where Shearin goes next.

While future stories could be told about Raine and the other characters in this series, I hope she expands and comes up with some new ones. I know I will follow and see how she does.

The entire review can be found here on Curled Up With a Good Book. Check it out and let me know what you think.