Title: The Last Star in the Void [on Amazon | on Goodreads]Series: The Echo Archives (3rd of 3 books)
Author: Melissa Caruso [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Multiverse, Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2026
Age: 16+ (the characters are all adults, and the book is indeed marketed to adults, but it can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 4.5/5
Pros: Fresh take on the multiverse trope with strong world-building. Engaging characters. Lots of intriguing action and a few well-placed twists Satisfying conclusion.
Cons: Despite the stakes being high, you never get the sense that one of our heroes could not make it.
WARNING! Blood, body horror, violence, entrapment.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy modern fantasy, deadly but cool alternate realities, world(s)-ending scenarios, action, humour, romances that don't swallow the plot, and new moms being badass.
Blurb: Kembral Thorne is back on the job. Everything is going great - she hasn’t been in mortal peril for months, her daughter is learning to crawl, and she’s thinking about getting serious with her girlfriend, cat burglar Rika Nonesuch. But then a simple mission goes wrong, and a mysterious Echo hires her for her most dangerous case yet. This time, the murder Kembral must solve is her own. Her first warning: Watch out above you. It won’t be her last. The cryptic messages give Kem an edge against her would-be murderer - but there’s more at stake than her own survival. Rips in the very fabric of reality are spreading through the Echoes, and Kem’s blood is the only thing that can close them. A traitor among her allies is willing to kill to stop her. To save all the worlds, Kem must figure out who she can trust - and Rika must decide how much of her humanity she’ll sacrifice for the power to protect the woman she loves. (Amazon)
Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.
BIG FINISH
OK, for those who haven't read the first two installments yet, a brief introduction (I'm quoting from my reviews for Book 1 and 2):
[...] the setting is a world similar to our own - albeit steeped in magic and giving off an early-20th-century vibe - except in this world twelve layers of reality exist: the root universe, or Prime, and its eleven Echoes, getting more and more grotesque and dangerous the farther you stray from their paradigm [...] Our protagonist Kembral belongs to a guild tasked with retrieving people (or things) that get abducted/swallowed by the Echoes [...]
...oh, and she's the single mother of a toddler (Emmi), and she's got a very unusual girlfriend (Rika) who used to be her nemesis. And she's about to face the consequences of her (and Rika's) actions in the previous installments...which includes her investigating her own murder (in a manner of speaking). Have I piqued your interest yet? 😉
I originally requested Book 1 in the series because I can't resist a multiverse setting, and this one put a hell of a spin on the trope to begin with. And I would lie if I said that the world-building didn't remain my favourite aspect of the trilogy (I'll talk about the other aspects below). Book 3 actually expands on Kembral's world, taking us as far as the eighth Echo (though briefly - the final confrontation takes place in the sixth), and since the inherently dangerous and freaky layers of reality are being contaminated and ultimately devoured by the titular Void, everything's even more unsettling and fearsome than usual...except at the same time both the Echoes and the creatures that inhabit them are a thing of (terrible) beauty and a triumph of the imagination. No only that - even so late in the game, Caruso keeps unveiling previously unknown details and rules of her world, so that this isn't only a new adventure, but the culmination of a big picture she's been painstakingly putting together since Book 1 - not to mention that the last installment brings the story full circle, putting all the main events/reveals from its predecessors to fruition. Frankly, the only thing that I regret is that we never got to see the eleventh - and last - Echo, but even so, if you're a multiverse fan, you'll find a lot to love here. [...]
