Hello, book I waited all year to read….

The big question: Was it satisfying and worth the wait?
The big answer: ……..maybe? But yes.

The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik, Book 3 in The Scholomance trilogy. This story picks up right where book 2 ends: El landing at her mother’s feet, finally free of the Scholomance, but her plan has gone wrong and try as she might, she cannot pull Orion through with her. The first part of the book is so sad and filled with pages of El lost in her own world as she (not really) tries to make sense of it all. The rest of the book explains a lot of questions we’ve had, highlights hints we missed along the way, and has some interesting events occur.

A few of the things that are explain in the book were pretty obvious for me from what was going on in previous books, but to find out who the BBEG was and what kind of horrible thing that person did threw me for a loop, although it totally made sense once I knew who it was. I felt that some of the sex stuff that happened in the book weren’t really natural to the characters (but I just might not subscribe to the use-sex-as-a-healing-distraction type of thing). Also, the prophecy reveal was predictable but not in an upfront, first assumption kind of way – it was really well done.

The ending was both satisfying, and sad, and I think that Novik did a great job leaving all these young adults open to the future. Not having any of them really tied down in relationships was a good move. Young people are too young for that, they need to live a little, learn who they are (outside of the Scholomance) and experience life before making long-term decisions.

I really did enjoy this book but after reading about a quarter of it in hardback, I was sort of bored so I ended up switching to Audiobook to finish it, which I think was the right choice. The narrator was excellent and when sped up to 1.3x, the pace was perfect.

If you wanted to know more about the Enclaves, how they were created, how they were maintained, and how dangerous and tragic they actually are, then this book will satisfy your curiosity. However, if you wanted to see El and Orion reunited in a magical love story filled with happy endings then you will not have a great time.

I rated The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik 4 out of 5. The audiobook was good so I will probably listen to the whole trilogy again in the future (as books 1 & 2 really were excellent).

If you’d like to read more about The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik, check it out on Goodreads.

---

| Join me on Goodreads |

---

Never miss a review, subscribe now!

---