Book Review

Championship: The Last Gambit by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (The Inheritance Games #iii)

Genre: Young Adult, Mystery, Thriller

Synopsis:

Avery'south fortune, life, and loves are on the line in the game that everyone will be talking almost.

To inherit billions, all Avery Kylie Grambs has to do is survive a few more weeks living in Hawthorne Firm. The paparazzi are dogging her every step. Financial pressures are building. Danger is a fact of life. And the but thing getting Avery through it all is the Hawthorne brothers. Her life is intertwined with theirs. She knows their secrets, and they know her.

But as the clock ticks downwardly to the moment when Avery will go the richest teenager on the planet, trouble arrives in the form of a company who needs her help—and whose presence in Hawthorne House could change everything. It soon becomes clear that there is one concluding puzzle to solve, and Avery and the Hawthorne brothers are drawn into a dangerous game against an unknown and powerful player.

Secrets upon secrets. Riddles upon riddles. In this game, in that location are hearts and lives at stake—and in that location is nothing more Hawthorne than winning.

Rating: 5 Stars

The opening to The Final Gambit was astonishing despite it being several months since I read the Hawthorne Legacy I establish it really easy to jump dorsum into the story and it definitely kicks off with a blindside. Avery is notwithstanding trying to figure out why she was chosen past Tobias since she knows that she isn't related to the Hawthorne family in any way simply there is a stiff connectedness between Toby and her mother which Avery is still trying to untangle and this is fabricated harder knowing that Toby is however alive and out there somewhere. Initially, Jameson and Greyson aren't in the picture since Jameson is travelling the earth looking for clues and finding some along the way but they don't make any sense at the moment and Greyson is at Harvard simply with Avery'due south xviiith birthday coming upwards both come home. This too clashes with the inflow of Eve at Hawthorne House, Eve is Toby's daughter and the but people that know this are Avery and Jameson. Eve explains that Toby has been kidnapped by someone that knew who he was and she was told to come to Avery if annihilation always happened to him. This obviously hurts the family peculiarly Greyson since Eve looks exactly like Emily but Avery understands her more and more with each day that passes since she is focused on only getting Toby back.

As nosotros approach the ¼ mark in the novel, whoever took Toby doesn't seem to want him for bribe or for the disk he took from Avery since they send it back to him with a coded message near revenge. This could only relate to the fire on Hawthorne Island but none of the families seem to be involved but information technology was heart-breaking to realise that Greyson doesn't know that his begetter is expressionless and Avery has kept this from him merely I agree with her choice since his mental land is very frail right now. Later on the first letter Avery spots more than and more clues in the notes only they don't add upwardly since it has to be someone who knew Toby, knew what he did on the island only isn't directly related to any of the families involved or it could exist about something completely dissimilar. They practice get some information on the disk from Skye of all people, who doesn't know what it is only she does know information technology was very of import to Tobias and when Toby escape Hawthorne House with it her father was furious. This deepens the mysteries we are dealing with since the pieces don't seem to be fitting together yet only I have a feeling that between them all they will figure it out, the question is tin can they solve the puzzle earlier something serious happens to Toby. I feel similar there is a similar vibe to the Good Girl'south Guide to Murder series with each book getting darker and I feel like someone might exist seriously injured or potentially killed in this book since I don't see another way Barnes tin can practice better than all the scares and angst in the 2nd book.

Equally we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, Avery is getting frustrated that nothing is happening and the game involving Toby doesn't seem to be going anywhere. However, it is Jameson who makes her realise that the person that has Toby might non take any connection to Tobias since the way they are planning their games are completely different so they simply need to wait for the next inkling to come and hope it is something they tin can utilise. Meanwhile, Tobias left another present for Avery and information technology was but to be given to her if she met Eve which means Tobias knew about her and notwithstanding picked Avery every bit his heir. This present is her own game centring around chess since the offset clue is the Queen'due south Gambit, a movement in chess where you sacrifice 1 piece to have control of the board but the question is who is Avery'southward piece she needs to sacrifice to control the rest. In the vault they find the jewelled chess ready and i piece contains a note from Tobias which is their adjacent clue but they are now stuck about what that clues means and what the others items that Tobias left for Avery mean. Honestly, the games are getting harder and with the tension rising I can't wait to meet what is going to happen now.

As we arroyo the halfway mark in the novel, we have two major games in play, the one with Toby'south kidnapper who they accept at present spoken to after opening the combination box containing a phone with a unmarried number and a inaugural timer. Later speaking to the mysterious human being going by Luke, they are pointed in the direction of the story relating to the prodigal son. However, they are very apace side-tracked trying to effigy out who the tertiary person and second son is but they don't know who is who in the story. At first the call back its about Toby and Tobias and at that place is some other Hawthorne out there simply that is shot down since Tobias was many things but never unfaithful. So they think that Tobias might be on of the sons but he has no living relatives and no siblings. However, Jameson when he learns nearly Avery's game makes the connections that it might be real game and they need to ignore Luke'south game for now. When Avery finally puts the pieces of the puzzle together she is led to her next clue but she has no idea what Tobias meant for her to learn or find with the game and I take a feeling the answers are going to exist on the corrupted USB stick and she needs to solve the other clues to figure out what that means. In between this Avery is witnessing the strange human relationship between Grayson and Eve which she doesn't think is a good idea because of Eve's connection to and Grayson's history with Emily only it seems to be happening anyway. Despite this with every new unsavoury thing they learn about Tobias the more than Grayson's prototype of himself is falling away and he has no idea what is going to be left of him when the game is done.

As we cross into the second one-half of the novel, Avery and the others are condign more and more than frustrated at not having the answers when they all of a sudden begin to get in in full force starting with a call from Toby's captor. Avery learns that this man is Vincent Blake and that Tobias used to work for him until he learn the kind of human he was working with and double crossed him to become a better version of him. Vincent didn't practise anything at the time because he appreciated the fact that Tobias knew how to play the game but something changed that and it was the nascency of Tobias' grandsons and the disappearance of Toby. Vincent played a huge role with Xander'due south begetter who wanted his son and was even prepared to fight for custody of him so Tobias ensured that he would never be able to do that keeping Xander for himself. Isaiah nonetheless wants to be a part of his son'due south life and that terrifies Zander into fleeing considering these boys have never had love without status or without pain in the instance of their mother. Isaiah went through the same process as Tobias learning to Blake really was and fleeing from him only without the double crossing and went to living a life where he'd never take to work from men like Blake and Tobias again. Now they can put a name to the voice on the other finish of the phone they simply have to figure out why Blake targeted Toby presumably the hardest of the Hawthorne family unit to pivot downwards since he faked his death rather than going after one of the grandsons peculiarly later the death of Tobias.

Equally we approach the ¾ mark in the novel, Avery ends up uncovering one of Tobias' darkest secrets and it explains why Blake is targeting her and Toby in the first identify. Information technology seems that Blake'due south son, Volition or Liam concluded upwardly getting Mallory pregnant when she was but 16 and not allowing that kind of behaviour since she was being manipulated Tobias did away with Liam hiding his body within Hawthorne House and its grounds. This cloak-and-dagger was eventually uncovered by Toby as well as his connection to the Blake family and this is the real reason he left Hawthorne House. Avery was called by Tobias because he knew that Blake would come after his family after his death and he wanted to direct his wrath from those he loved and so Avery was chosen to exist cannon fodder for Blake'south attacks only Tobias also knew in that location was a expert chance Avery would survive these attacks and grow stronger. Now the final plays have to exist made since Avery has removed Eve, Blake's spy from Hawthorne Firm and he still has Toby but since the Queen's Gambit has been mentioned a lot I am thinking a sacrifice is going to accept to exist made for control of the board and Avery beingness the person she is might cede herself leaving everything in Toby'southward hands equally the prodigal son returning rather than risk the lives of the people she has come up to dearest.

As nosotros cross into the final department of the novel, we finally get to see all the pieces come up together not just from this book but from the entire trilogy and I accept to say it concluded with a massive bang. While I didn't retrieve there were any major twists at the end there were some and one or ii left me completely speechless. Honestly, Barnes is an amazing author and I am going to continue read anything she puts out but I am scared that nothing in her backlist will tiptop the utter perfection that is the Inheritance Games and if you haven't picked it up yet I highly recommend it. It has some of the best graphic symbol development in a realistic setting I have ever seen, the characters are flawed, broken and utterly human to the very terminate. The setting is rich and lush without feeling stale as we same in the same identify for the majority of the trilogy and the feeling of the entire series existence one large puzzle was pulled of with mastery and I tin't look to read more from Barnes in the future.

About the Author:

Jennifer Lynn Barnes (who mostly goes by Jen) was built-in in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She has been, in turn, a competitive cheerleader, a volleyball role player, a dancer, a debutante, a primate noesis researcher, a teen model, a comic book geek, and a lemur aficionado. She's been writing for every bit long as she tin remember, finished her first full book (which she at present refers to every bit a "exercise book" and which none of you volition ever see) when she was still in high school, and then wrote Golden the summertime subsequently her freshman yr in college, when she was 19.

Jen graduated high school in 2002, and from Yale University with a degree in cognitive scientific discipline (the written report of the brain and thought) in May of 2006. She'll exist spending the 2006-2007 school year abroad, doing autism research at the University of Cambridge in the Britain.

Author Links: Website Twitter Instagram Goodreads

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I received this review re-create for consideration from TBR and Beyond Tours.