I received this book for free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Transcendent (Denazen, #4) by Jus Accardo Published by Entangled Publishing on March 2, 2020
Genres: Contemporary, Paranormal, Romance, Young Adult
Pages: 272
Read it as: eARC
Source: Netgalley
My rating:
Check it out in Goodreads
Synopsis
The boy she’d lost, and finally found again, is not the same boy she remembers. As one of the most powerful Sixes, Kale has changed in ways Dez can’t ignore.
He swore he’d never kill, and now he’s out for blood.
He swore he’d never harm her, and now he struggles to control his fatal touch.
They’ve been to hell and back, over and over, but this time they might not survive the fire.
When the truth at the root of the Denazen Corporation’s origins begins to unfold, those behind the scenes will do anything to keep it hidden.
Dez and Kale will be pushed to their breaking point. As long buried secrets come to light, they must fight for their freedom—and each other—as they never have before.
Kale’s destructive power could win the battle, if he doesn’t lose himself to it in the process. Or Dez will be faced with an impossible task—saving the world from the boy she loves.
In short: No, I expected better. It’s so painful to say this because I can’t imagine what the author must have been through to finish this series. For years I think a lot of the readers who started this journey had already given up, forever seeing that book as Untitled in Goodreads.
I wish I could say, wow this book blew me away and it was worth every day of wait. But I’m sorry, I can’t.
First, I’ll share a little of what I did like about this book, and then I’ll touch on the points that ultimately made it fail to live up to its potential.
I missed the characters and they stayed true to their stories
Dez, Kale, even the bad guys, I love them all. I followed them for three books prior, so I was ready to see the awesome conclusion.
Something I was worried about after such a long time was that maybe the characters would sound different? That the journey they’d had up until this point wouldn’t match with their representation in this book. But I was happy to discover that it was a seamless transition in that sense. I didn’t get the feeling that suddenly Dez or anyone else was acting ‘out of character’.
But even though being back in this world was amazing, now I have to talk about what bothered me while I was reading.
Treasure hunt-like plot doesn’t do book any favors
It really doesn’t.
I was expecting this really fast-paced, tension-filled journey for this last book, but instead there was a… treasure hunt. At least that’s what it felt like.
First they had to find someone, then it turns out they’re leaving clues at specific places and they have to get the clues before the other team (Denazen) does. It just seemed so very basic. There was a reason for this kind of plot but still it just wasn’t fun to read. Now that I think about it, it was probably because the characters did a lot of waiting around until the next clue so they weren’t actively acting and making things happen.
It was convoluted, and even Dez said so. Unfortunately, having a character recognize a flaw in the book doesn’t really fix the issue.
Missing key interactions between main characters
I don’t know about other readers, but for me, from the beginning this series was about Kale and Dez. Them meeting each other was what set everything in motion, and while the revolution of the Sixes could probably go on without them, they’re still key players in this whole thing.
From the beginning, this has also been about their relationship, because that’s what the books have been building up since chapter one of the first book. I was disappointed to find that this last book lacked so much interactions between them! I kept waiting for more sweet scenes between them giving each other strength, growing as the power couple I know they are.
Instead, for the majority of the book they’re struggling with Kale’s powers going wild, something that continues being a problem up until the very end of the book. After everything they went through, the closure they get in the end just wasn’t enough.
Wrong villain for the climactic event
These are a few things I learned a while ago about antagonists and story structure:
- You can have more than one antagonist
- There should be a main antagonist that stands directly in opposition to the main character and who has the most powerful connection with them.
- In spite of how many antagonists you may have, it’s the main antagonist, who the protagonist should confront at last. They should work their way through the obstacles until they get to the one that they’d always dreaded confronting, the ultimate threat.
That… didn’t happen in Transcendent.
A new antagonist popped up, the big boss, the one who had been pulling the strings all along. He was taken down incredibly easily, which was a bit of a let down too. I couldn’t summon any elation about that, because he hadn’t been properly introduced in one of the previous books. For me he wasn’t the real antagonist.
Now, onto the next ray of sunshine. This character I really hated because his powers were incredibly dangerous. I’m not sure about his motivations, but still, how he opposed our main characters was interesting because he was a real threat. The confrontation with him was left for the last minute, giving his character an importance I didn’t feel he deserved. True, he had dangerous powers, but besides that, he barely knew Dez and Kale. So even though I really wanted our guys to beat him, the climax was missing a major emotional element because this character wasn’t the right antagonist to focus on.
Then we have the character who, in my opinion, was the threat they’d always needed to beat. He was there from the beginning, messing with our main characters’ lives so deeply, but also was the reason they were brought together. Dez and Kale were united in their quest to see this person be taken down.
Their confrontation with him was interesting, but it was majorly downplayed. Maybe he wasn’t at the top of the chain of baddies in the Denazen organization, and wasn’t the biggest threat to the world, but he was the biggest threat for these specific characters.
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I wish I’d enjoyed this more, but well, sometimes this happens. I’m happy for the others longtime fans who did like this book very much!
What’s the longest you’ve waited for a book to come out?
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A note on the marketing of this book:
All my reading notes aside, I’m seeing the publishing of this book wasn’t advertised enough. There were just one or two posts about it on the publisher’s social media. It seemed as if they’d already given up before it even came out. I mean… Man. They could have first built up buzz about the first books in the series -which are great and action-packed -and then reward everyone with the final book. Do a reread of all the books to refresh our memories…
I mean, a lot of readers seemed to really enjoy this book, so I assume even more would have liked it too, if they heard about the series.
That’s just my two cents.
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