"There was once a time when darkness shrouded the world, and the darkness had a queen."

Adelina Amouteru is done suffering. She’s turned her back on those who have betrayed her and achieved the ultimate revenge: victory. Her reign as the White Wolf has been a triumphant one, but with each conquest her cruelty only grows. The darkness within her has begun to spiral out of control, threatening to destroy all she’s gained.

When a new danger appears, Adelina’s forced to revisit old wounds, putting not only herself at risk, but every Elite. In order to preserve her empire, Adelina and her Roses must join the Daggers on a perilous quest—though this uneasy alliance may prove to be the real danger.

Lara | ★★★★½☆

A year after Adelina’s conquest for the Kenettran throne Adelina keeps conquering other countries. The Daggers are now in Tamoura trying to stop her, while the power of all elites is slowly turning against them. In order to save the world from poison sipping in grim the Underworld, they must all work together and enter the realm of the gods.

I finished this book a couple of days ago and still feel like an emotional wreck. After so many pain, anger and betrayal, the last book in this trilogy were full of surprises, revelations and, finally, redemptions. Book was a bit slower- paced than first two books and there weren’t so many twists, battles or happenings like there were in the first two, but I did not mind because the plot was really interesting and intense. I just wish The Midnight Star was longer. I mean, it rounded up the whole story great and I liked it, but it was shorter than I expected.

Adelina’s journey was indeed something special. Through the second book, she sank even deeper, becoming an evil ruler with a twisted sense of justice. The Midnight Star was focused on Adelina’s relationship with her sister and her life without her. As she descends in madness and her power starts destroying her, Violetta is still trying to help her. Even though I don’t like Violetta, I loved this representation of pure sisterly love. Adelina’s redemption and sacrifice for her sister were exactly what this book needed for an ending. After everything she has done, she realized she was selfish.*spoiler* She decides her power she loves so much is poisoning her life and that she couldn’t live with herself if she left her sister. That was the most beautiful moment in the whole book- she gave her life for her sister, with her last thought being of Magiano...

I expected it to end in some way like this, but it still shocked me. I am really glad Adelina found some kind of happiness in the end, even though it breaks my heart she was separated from Magiano and Violetta. Although Adelina did a lot of terrible things, I think she was a villain with a lot of light inside. Her power just made it harder to deal with all the pain and anger, but I loved reading about her a lot.



There was a bit more space for character development and interactions. Although Adelina was deeply and widely characterized and developed, we could definitely get more of Magiano, Sergio and Violetta’s relationship, Lucent and Maeve’s relationship and other side characters who were mentioned a lot, but didn’t get a chance to grow and interact, rather than just contribute to the plot itself.

The whole world building and plot had and an interesting ending with Elites entering the god realm. It was fun to read about characters working together towards the same goal, instead of fighting. I wanted to know where do their powers come from and I think it was all wrapped up pretty well, a story of the immortal and mortal world.

I enjoyed reading these series infinitely and hope to find more interesting characters as Adelina. I will probably feel sad and happy at the same time for a few more days, but that’s why I like this book so much.

Lina | ★★★★☆

Marie Lu has once again proven that she knows how to end her series with a bang. A bang of bittersweet emotions, that is, that made me want to cry and smile at the same time.

The Midnight Star opens with Adelina, now a queen of Kenettra, conquering yet another of its neighbouring countries. In the year that has passed since she first sat on the throne, she has grown even more dark and twisted. Full of hatred for all those who wronged her in her life and now that she has found herself in a position of power, she takes her chance to exact revenge. But as her illusions spin more and more out of control, she starts sinking deeper into madness, becoming even more vicious and unpredictable. It is soon revealed that all the other Elites are falling ill as well, and that Raffaele’s omnious prediction about their powers killing them is slowly but surely coming true. They all need to choose between joining forces with their certain enemies to try and stop what is happening and their certain death.

The plot was a bit faster paced and more intense than The Rose Society, which certainly made it more interesting to read, but also meant that the books was a little shorter. Usually, I would have preferred that, but here I felt like at least some more time could be spent to further develop some of the characters. I am glad that we were finally given the long overdue explanation for the whole magic system though, as well as some background to what caused the Blood Fever. The world-building still seemed vague, but I can’t say that it bothered me as it only added to the whole mystical feel of the story. In fact, I wouldn’t mind revisiting this world sometime soon.

Unlike Lu’s other works, where there is always an outside problem which requires a solution, this is almost singularly a character driven novel. As there are no ultimately good or bad characters in this series, at the end it all came down to everyone pursuing their own agenda, usually without caring much about the consequences it might have on those around them. Even though the Blood Fever which set this series into motion was not of character’s doing, nearly every other twist and obstacle those characters have faced was either a direct consequence or a repercussion of their actions. For me, it was quite intriguing and refreshing to read about this aspect of power, especially since we usually only get to see the other side of it.

Adelina was by far the most complex one of the most intriguing characters. Her descent into madness throughout this series has been slow and deliberate, and in The Midnight Star she is walking a thin line between losing herself completely and what resembles sanity. She is deeply afraid of being betrayed everyone around her and of losing all her power and all that fear makes her a truly vicious ruler. She causes destruction to everything around her and pursues only her own selfish interests, no matter the cost. (*spoilers until the end of the paragraph*) That precisely made the ending all the more powerful, as Adelina realized that the very powers she thought she couldn’t live without were, in fact, making her life miserable and that giving them up would mean for her to finally get a chance at happiness, but still decided to sacrifice it all for her sister.


Adelina and Violetta’s relationship was one of my favourite in this whole series. Despite being at odds with each other, it was clear that they still cared deeply about each other. I have to admit that, even though I didn’t really like Violetta in the previous books, I found the faith she had in Adelina when everyone else thought she was too deep gone really admirable. And not to even mention that last scene! It was definitely the most beautiful representation of pure sisterly love which held on even through its ups and downs, something we definitely need more of in YA genre.

When it comes to other characters, it bothered me that some of them we knew almost nothing about, even though they practically every other scene. Sergio, for example—I would have liked to find out more about his life after the Daggers left him; surely it hasn’t been easy for him—but I guess Lu didn’t find his arc important for the plot. The same goes for Michel, the architect, whom we know almost nothing about, despite him being a part of the cast since the beginning of this series. I’m also really sorry that Magiano didn’t get more screen time, as he seemed like an interesting character with a lot of potential whom I’d definitely like to find out some more about.
Teren Santoro and Raffaele Laurent Bessette had the biggest character arcs besides Adelina. I found them both to be equally fascinating, Teren with his madness and utter devotion to his cause, and Raffaele with his cunningness concealed by his kindness and ability to sway almost everyone to his side.


Despite there being more than a few couples, romantic relationships didn’t take over the plot at any point. Quite the contrary, I actually hoped some of them would be more developed (e.g. Violetta and Sergio, Lucent and Maeve). Magiano and Adelina were my favourites, and I loved how their relationship gave a twist to the usual ‘good-girl-bad-boy’ trend.

The ending had an unearthly, mystical feel which suited the overall mood of the story perfectly. Even though it was quite easy to predict which direction was the plot going to take, it didn’t make the conclusion any lesser. If only, it added to the feeling of rightness I got as the end neared. I remember closing the book, nearly on the verge of tears, and thinking that this was just the way things were supposed to be. Not everything was perfect, but somehow it was for the best.