House of Flame and Shadow by Sarah J. Maas

In a return out of the middling range in which I found the second book, House of Sky and Breath, Maas lands quite a punch in this fast-paced, action-packed rounding out (I dare not call it a conclusion...) of the story arc that began in House of Earth and Blood.

Maas's heroine in this series, Bryce Quinlan, and the world she inhabits are perhaps the most grounded in a reality that is often strikingly similar to our own, fantasy beings and creatures aside. In many ways, Bryce is the most markedly different of Maas's three series' main characters. Her demeanor and many character-defining traits always reminds of a post-Mean Girls (2004) Regina George. You know, the one who has learned to channel her aggression into victories on the lacrosse field rather than diabolical domination of the school.

The Crescent City series is the most densely packed of the three, and I think the theories that are out there regarding the lack of a full world map, rather than the Crescent City map, is possibly a huge hint that we are just beginning to see the connections Maas has been working on for over a decade.