SPOILERS AHEAD: This is the final book of The Lunar Chronicles. Spoilers for the entire series will be in this review.
Gosh I love a good retelling, but this really wasn’t that. Winter was about 90% grand finale and about 10% actual retelling material that was INCREDIBLY bogged down by the fact that it was about 450 pages too long.
The crew is finally ready (or as ready as you can be) to take down Levana. Yeah. That’s it. That’s the entire summary.
MY GOD. As this was a reread, I knew that Winter was the biggest book in the series, but THIS IS A WHOPPING 823 PAGES. Yes you read that right. 823. Pages. That just- it is more than double the length of the first book in the series. I mean, what?? Pushing that aside- oh wait, I can’t because the length made the plot feel WAY too stretched out for the finale. Don’t get me wrong, the actual story was fine, but the pairing of a “meh” storyline with it being way too long was too much for me. On top of that, we take 700 (yes 700) pages to get to the “big battle” and only take 123 pages to wrap up the battle that took 3 books and 700 pages to get to, while also getting a resolution that managed to feel like what happens when you take a bite into a chocolate expecting sweet, rich chocolate while instead you get attacked by a wave of raspberries. (Not good.)
Bottom line: Winter was an ok story that was bogged down by the length being way too long and an unsatisfying ending that left you wondering, “What was all that build up for?”