The 39th book I read this year was Sorrow and Starlight by Susanne Valenti & Caroline Peckham, this the 8th book in the Zodiac Academy series and it has taken me a billion years to finally read it.
You can find my review of the rest of the series plus the novellas here.
Obviously being that this is book 8 in a 9 part series, there will be spoilers, especially ones that are specifically relevant to the end of book 7, if you choose to read on anyway, you have been warned.
An attempt at summarising
The story picks up after the tumultuous ending of the last book, Darcy is cursed to be a shadow beast that controlled by Lavinia, Orion has struck some strange bargain with Lavinia to free Darcy of the curse but only after he is tortured for 3 months. They are both imprisoned by Lionel in the Palace of Souls.
Tory is trying to pick up the pieces of the rebellion and recover from losing Darius, all while her twin has been captured. She sets out to discover a way to bring him back, using magic that doesn’t rely on the Stars but also one that isn’t dark magic. As her army continue to carry out small missions to help the ‘lesser orders’ Lionel has imprisoned and prepare for another battle, they float on an island in the sea, making it impossible for the captured Gabriel to reveal their whereabouts with the sight.
The heirs are all reeling from Darius’s death too, Seth and Caleb continue their odd dance of pretending that they don’t like the other all that much, even though both are heart sickeningly in love with the other.
Tory discovers magic that predates the Stars and even though it’s highly unstable and requires blood sacrifices, she’s decides to use it to bring Darius back after a mission to rescue Darcy fails, because she chose to stay with Orion (who can’t leave because of the bargain), rather than leave to support her grieving sister.
What did I think?
Now, I will acknowledge the fact that I accidentally read 8.5 first, not realising that it largely covers the events of book 8 from Dairus’s POV beyond the veil. This may be colouring my opinion of this book but I honestly found it a slog to get through. It was morbid speech after morbid speech about how sad Tory was, how sad Seth was and so on and so on. Like it was trying to eek out a nearly a thousand page long emotional response to the, already effectively devastating, end of book 7. It wasn’t necessary and it felt very much like a filler book.
I rinsed through the first 6 books so quickly, I really loved this series and felt so unlike things that were out but also had all the elements I like in a fantasy series but book 8 had me stalled for well over a year or more.
I think, having now read 9, I would recommend skipping 8.5 if it makes you lose momentum because almost everything we learn with Darius beyond the veil, he ends up having to repeat to the MC’s in book 9…
Anyway, my review of book 9 will be coming very soon, I’m excited to have finally made progress with this series.
Antonia Bernardin 