Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as a read-along book club.
Here we go with the last chapter in this book, Chapter 35. The killer was caught in our previous chapter, the only victim we care about survived and all is well until the sequel, where a disease that strikes multiracial people suddenly pops up. That’s the book that led me to this one, as I read that one first.
We’ll go over this chapter, drop a few final faults, before doing a proper book report over on my other website, The Clutter Reports, followed next week by the reveal of the next book in the Chapter By Chapter review series. First, we need to wrap this one up.
This chapter is pretty much an epilogue. Everyone, including Amanda, is resting at Sarek’s place. Kirk’s arm will be paralyzed for a few days and Amanda, like Daniel when he tested the process, is a bit younger physically but she managed to keep some grey in her hair. It’s a respectful level. From there Amanda wants to know the full story, and after a bit of teasing as only our two resident Vulcans can do, Kirk begins the story. While it doesn’t recap the entire book, it does recap the last couple of chapters, possibly to get Amanda’s reaction, and given an explanation why Eleyna only killed from a distance, that she couldn’t get close to the results of her actions. That’s why she left Kirk to die rather than poison or stab him in the desert, and tried to take the opportunity to make Amanda’s death look like a failing in the stasis field generating equipment, unaware of the other two patients. Remember, she also didn’t mean to start the fire, just erase the results of her hacking. Basically, this just fill in the minor questions readers might have about Eleyna’s actions and motivations, which is good.
It also wraps up some of the character moments, with Sarek and Spock’s messing with Amanda, her reactions to hearing of the deaths and marriage she missed out on, confirming that Sendet’s group chose exile to another planet, the aforementioned cleaning up of explaining Eleyna’s actions, and Sarek giving Spock a lyre that belong to his grandfather, keeping the tradition going. Spock even plays a song that Kirk recognize as part Earth style and part Vulcan style with a few other planets’ styles.
All in all this was a good book. While I still wish the murder plot, the title plot of the book, and all the character moments were better dispersed through the book and integrated into the story, it was an enjoyable read. Having gotten the sequel first, which I still haven’t re-read since my first readthrough, it was nice to read it in the proper order this time. Someday we’ll get to that book, but next time we reveal the next book in the Chapter By Chapter review series…and hopefully this time the characters won’t come off as such a-holes!
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