The prior books of this series mostly had to do with how the two groups of people at the heart of the series interacted with outsiders, from families to small groups of thugs to communities. This book is all about the showdown between the surviving members of the two groups who are now living together uneasily in an abandoned Girl Scout camp in Maine and the person who’s been the villain for three or four books. It felt odd, after the broader scope of the other books, to have this book shrink down so narrowly, both in the area covered and with the people it focused on.
Mike, the villain, was injured at the end of the last book, and the author did a great job showing us at the beginning of the book how his terrible wound became infected, and he became delirious because of infection. One particular chapter at the start brilliantly depicted the instability of his mind and his perception of his world. After this first part, though, we didn’t see or hear much from Mike’s perspective until the very end. That’s unfortunate, because it was fascinating, and I was curious about what was going on with him. Surely, the author could tell us even if she kept the characters in the dark!
Most of the story is a cat-and-mouse game between Mike and the rest of the people. Mike’s done enough that the group just wants to find him and make sure that he is no longer a threat to anyone. Mike thinks he’s smarter than everybody, as he’s thought through this series, and that he will eventually be able to get them all right where he wants them in the end. While some squabbling between the two groups of people brought together in the last book rears its ugly head on multiple occasions because of histories that can’t be overcome simply and the innate challenge of making two groups who are only just getting to know each other into a solid team able face their mutual foe.
For most of the book, despite his injuries and delirium, Mike appeared to be always a step or more ahead of the good guys. As a nurse who’s seen people with actual delirium, this part of the story made little sense. He crafted some pretty ingenious traps that just, honestly, would not have been possible for a man in his state of mind. Chapters narrated by him made it clear he was slipping in and out of reality. Most of his traps were complex, which would have required logical reasoning to set up so that they would truly do what he intended. That’s really my only quibble with the book.
I enjoyed watching the two groups of people truly meld into a unit as they worked together to bring down the man who cost them so much. Of course, we lose some key members of the good guys because of Mike’s traps and outright violence. I had grown enough to care about the characters in this book that losing them in rapid succession brought a tear to my eye both times. I have to say this author does a fantastic job of characterization, even in large series like this one. This series and this book had a lot of players in it, yet each had his or her own growth arc and moments that were tests of their character that were so true to what we’d been shown of the characters before. These characters lived and breathed on the page, a rare and wonderful accomplishment by any writer.
Of course, eventually, good wins over evil, but even victory brings more losses to the group. But they’ve been so resilient so far you know everyone will be okay afterward. Happily, the epilogue, which takes place 18 months later, shows us that. I like it when authors make the epilogue a well-deserved victory lap. Highly recommended, but you definitely need to read or listen to the rest of the books in this series to appreciate what happens in this book.