We’ve reached the end of the road for The Up-and-Under and what a finale. I’ve loved being thrown into this world. Coming from this almost meta point of view by reading these stories from Middlegame, if you love McGuire’s novella’s this is a must read! Keep reading this book review for my full thoughts.
Summary
The end of the improbable road.
Since stumbling from their world into the Up-and-Under, Avery and Zib have walked the improbable road across forests, seas, and skies, finding friends in the unlikeliest of places and enemies great in number, as they make their way toward the Impossible City in the hope of finding their way home.
But the final part of their journey is filled with danger and demise. Not everyone will make it through unscathed. Not everyone will make it through alive.
The final part of the enchanting Up and Under quartet reminds us of the value of friendship and the price one sometimes pays for straying from the path. No one’s safety can be guaranteed under the smokestrewn sky.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
The series conclusion feels lyrical from the beginning. It has all the hallmarks of a bedtime fable. There’s this wisdom and whimsy all at once. If that sounds familiar, it’s because it’s my immediate thought whenever I read a novella from Seanan McGuire. Full of stories within stories, Under the Smokestrewn Sky features moments of truth that children stories hide like gold. It’s descriptive, but also hazy transporting us into a world of magic and rules that seem to twist on their axis.
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Even if the journey doesn’t take us where we thought, our lives will change. We will change into someone else entirely. Who we leave will be someone changed – but for the better? Under the Smokestrewn Sky is a novella that was bewitching. I love how so much of this series is devoted to the price of knowledge, of informed choices, and the prices we can pay without realizing. Some lines have stuck with me even now. It’s a fantastic and fitting ending to a wonderful novella series. Find Under the Smokestrewn Sky on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop.org, & Blackwells.