The entertaining chronicle of the Wars of the Roses that began with Stormbird concludes in Ravenspur that takes the reader from the year 1470 to 1485 in a succession of battles, attainments and dramatic journeying of historic personalities that all command the pages until the departing historical notes from the author. As with the other novels in this intriguing series we are briefly introduced to the old wounds and painful grievances that refuse to heal over with time or seizing of the crown and thrown directly onto the path of vengeance and cruel struggles of survival or conscience that will be met by enemy and ally in different ways. Unlike Bloodline (#3 Wars of the Roses) or Stormbird (#1 Wars of the Roses), where only action rules the chapters with little dialogue to connect the reader to important scenes or historic names, we are given in Ravenspur (#4 Wars of the Roses) rich passages of believable discussions with the familiar lyrical descriptions of the surrounding landscapes and symbolic scenes of weather changes or wonderfully timed observations from characters that may remind many of Trinity/Margaret of Anjou (#2 Wars of the Roses). I don't believe I can honestly call Ravenspur a stand-alone novel (I would recommend to anyone new to this series or portion of history to please pick up and begin with Stormbird to get the full experience of events or explanation of certain motives, but that is your choice). It may disappoint some returning readers to know that this final novel is a slow burn story with quite a bit of repetition hitting the passages, however, on the other side of the coin, the heart-pounding battles scenes are as vivid as they come and Mr. Iggulden's gift for weaving a compelling story ultimately creates a finale that raises the right banners over a true "season of revenge" and really shouldn't be missed.
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