As if it had heard my small grumbles about the previous book, this felt a lot more personal, so that was satisfying. Part of that is to do with developments in the story, and part of that is because I felt more confident that my interpretation of Tremaine’s character.

She doesn’t easily reveal certain feelings to people around her -- and doesn’t always understand or identify those emotions privately to herself. So one has to look at the pattern of her behaviour and read between the lines. I ended up enjoying that subtlety.

This was a tense and satisfying conclusion (and there’s more I could say, except, spoilers).

His expression said plainly that if she thought this was easy, she was crazy. He told her, “I don’t know what’s in your head, but when you get over it, I’ll be here.” ( )

I love Martha Wells' various takes on gender throughout her books, and this series in no exception. Tremaine is a great heroine. I love how she falls into every sort of danger and then just fearlessly kicks ass. I also love that she is basically never the emotionally competent one in any of her relationships. ( )

This book is the third and final novel in Martha Well’s Fall of Ile-Rein trilogy, a fantasy series with portals to multiple worlds, airships, and invaders from another world. It’s also a series that you need to read in order. I’ll potentially be including spoilers for earlier books in this review, so head over to my review of the first book, The Wizard Hunters, if you’re unfamiliar with the series.

Using the spheres and their new knowledge of other worlds, Tremaine and her friends have new hope of saving Ile-Rein from the Gardier. They have their sights set on Lodun, the besieged city of wizards. But the quest to rescue Lodun leads them to places stranger than they could have imagined.

Martha Wells doesn’t write comedic fantasy, but her work nonetheless always manages to make me laugh. I think it’s because her humor always comes from the characters and their interactions with each other. Plus, there’s a lot of sources for humor with the culture clashes between worlds — just look at Tremaine’s marriage to Ilias! Although my favorite has to be Gerald and his reactions to the antics of the others. He reminds me a tad of Stone from her Raksura series.

I believe that each book in a series should expand on the world in some way, and The Gate of Gods definitely does this. While trying to develop a new type of gate, Tremaine and the rest of the group find a set of ruins in Ilias’s world that get to the heart of the magical gates and show a new side to these worlds, their history, and the Gardier themselves.

I sometimes could get secondary characters confused, but over the course of this series I’ve become increasingly attached to the main cast. I love Tremaine’s prickliness for one. I was also thrilled with the return of Nicolas in the last book, since I enjoyed him so much in Death of the Necromancer. I really want to read more about Nicolas and what he was doing during all these series. Hmm, maybe it’s time to get to that Ile-Rein short story collection I have on hand…

The beginning might have been a bit slow, but by the end I couldn’t put The Gate of Gods down. It’s a satisfying conclusion to a solid fantasy series. It speaks to the strength of Wells’s capabilities as a writer that this is actually one of her middling works. She’s just that fantastic.

Originally posted on The Illustrated Page. ( )

A satisfying end to a trilogy that began badly. The plot ramps up the stakes and excitement, but Wells never lets it overshadow her characters. Good, well-written fantasy.
( )

A fun series. Overall I enjoyed it, but I was disappointed to learn what was behind the Gardier's plans and the sorcerer crystals. It felt like the worldbuilding had been leading toward something more complex.

Time to read the earlier book(s?) set in this universe! ( )

Jan09:

Characters: Still great. And you get back daddy! The enemies are not as cool here though.
Plot: A little weaker. Couldn't maintain the intensity.
Style: Still solid. A very cool finish. ( )

Completing the cycle of the fall of Ile-Rien one finally gets some answers to the origins of the Gardier menace, which has been my one frustration with a story that I have otherwise enjoyed a great deal. Show me a totalitarian state and there's usually an ideology, and I'll admit that my training as a historian was making me wonder when the philisophical punch line was going to be delivered. Well, like most great evils, the actual driving force behind the Gardier turns out to be a rather tawdry thing, if no less dangerous for the nature of its shallowness. One can argue that Martha Wells is much like a movie director who is not giving you a good look at her monster until the last moment she possibly can, both for shock affect, and to keep you from noticing the sad superficiality of it all. To give Wells her due, such is often the nature of the tragic fairy tales.

As for the fate of Tremaine Valiarde, Illias, and the rest, you can read the book to find out! And you should. ( )

Wonderful series! I love Martha Wells. ( )

I wasn't expecting _The Fall of Ile-Rien_ to be a trilogy. I had anticipated at least a couple more books, so when things looked like they might resolve when I was two-thirds of the way through this, I braced myself for a really annoying cliffhanger. But no. It all resolved. A good adventure book. I need to go back and re-read Death of the Necromancer, though. I feel like the atmosphere of that book was a little lost in all of the world-hopping that was going on in this series. ( )

Third book in the "Fall of Ile-Rien" trilogy, this brings the tale to a satisfying conclusion. Well-drawn characters in a world you can care about.

The conclusion of the Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy, where the bad guys are overcome, and everybody gets their just desert. As good as the previous books, this book start in the world of Ile-Rien, where the Ravenna is in exile, preparing to go into battle and free Ile-Rien from the Gardier using wizardry. The Gardier attachs, and the Ravenna flees to the world of Cineth with one wizard aboard, while the rest of the company is forced to flee through a worldgate with unknown destination.
Following the trails left by an earlier wizard explorer they discover the origin of the Gardier, and ends up in Cineth. The company is reunited, and goes back to Ile-Rien to free it from Gardier. After destroying the mastermind behind the Gardier invasion, the worldgates are no longer functional, and the Gardier are easily disarmed. ( )

http://vierran45.livejournal.com/80755.html ( )