Wings of silver. Wings of blue. Mortal heart. Broken dreams. Shatter. Shatter. Shatter. A sundering. A grave. I see the end. I see. . .

The world is in chaos as the power surge of the Cascade rises to a devastating crescendo. In furiously resisting its attempts to turn Elena into a vessel for Raphael’s power, Elena and her archangel are irrevocably changed. . .far beyond the prophecy of a cursed Ancient.

At the same time, violent and eerie events around the world threaten to wipe out entire populations. And in the Archangel Lijuan’s former territory, an unnatural fog weaves through the land, leaving only a bone-chilling silence in its wake. Soon it becomes clear that even the archangels are not immune to this deadly evil. This time, even the combined power of the Cadre may not be enough. . .

This war could end them all.

ARCHANGEL’S WAR

by Nalini Singh

This is the 12th installment in this series and it’s still going strong. Can you believe it? In ARCHANGEL’S WAR Nalini Singh picks up seven months after the cruel cliffhanger she threw at us after which Raphael and Elena wake up fundamentally changed.

Elena P. Deveraux, Guild Hunter and consort to an archangel, was not about to let the Cascade twist her personality to bitterness and despair. She was going to fucking own this new chance at life.

You can’t help but worry about them, how this will influence their relationship. Our favorite couple and the people close to them are going through a challenging time and the worst is yet to come. The first couple of chapters show us Raphael’s anxiety, with him being not sure if Elena will be the same or if she has become the mindless power reservoir for the archangel that the Cascade intended for her to be. We follow Elena coming to terms with the loss of her wings and then evolving, finding her new powers and how she doesn’t know how they are supposed to help her in the looming war.

“Wings do not make you my lover. That has always been your heart, your spirit, your courage—and your fury.”

And then there is the breathtakingly beautiful love between Raphael and Elena that just tugs at your heart. These two, gah. If there was ever a doubt (there wasn’t) that they were supposed to be, Archangel’s War will rid you of that.

We get to spend time with our favorites Bluebell, Aodhan, Venom and Dmitri. Don’t you love Raphael’s second and Elena’s relationship and how they pretend that they hate each other but secretly totally dig one another? I do. Their banter is funny AF. I also loved getting a little more details about Montgomery and how Raphael accepted and even delighted in his butler’s quirks.

War was a certainty.

This installment concludes Lijuan’s story arch which culminates in a full blown war that plays out on the pages. While it is action packed I found that it went on a little bit too long and I found myself wishing for it to be over.

Nalini Singh’s love for details is stunning – ARCHANGEL’S WAR just shows how much thought has gone into this world, how complex and flawlessly designed it is. And let’s not forget this author’s remarkable and exquisite writing style and storytelling – that alone makes this book worth reading and I marked so many passages, I’m sad that I can’t quote all of them here.

He brushed his hand over the near-white silk of her hair, what he felt for her such a huge violence inside him that it had no name. “To the end and beyond, hunter-mine.”

So now that this story arch is over I’m a little directionless. I know there is still a lot to tell about the vast cast of this series but the author doesn’t give us much to speculate. We still have to see Bluebell fall in love and find his match and then there is broken and sweet Aodhan, who needs someone to make him a little less broken. However, I have no clue what is going to happen next so I hope Nalini Singh writes fast because I CANNOT WAIT to find out what she has in store.