In Conclusion, despite some of the cons I have for this novel I still thought it was very good. Overall, I would recommend the series, it's imaginative, fun and at times philosophical just a great series as a whole.

And then: The glimpses into the many of the sixty-four ringdoms, one more preposterous than the other, made me wish we spent ten more volumes gallivanting around.

Fantasy Books Of The Year

Artificial Limbs: An unknown inventor replaces missing limbs through mysterious, highly advanced science, powered by a glass vial filled with a glowing red substance. Mason, Everdeen (13 November 2018). "The 5 best science fiction and fantasy novels of 2018". Washington Post . Retrieved 23 November 2018. I thought it becoming a science fiction novel by the end was interesting. Especially because we knew this novel as a steampunk fantasy.

All of this sounds as if I'm preparing you for disappointment. And I'm really not. It's a great book. An easy 5*. The entire cast of characters is also wonderful. Senlin, Edith, Adam, Byron, and all the others have distinctive, entertaining personalities and have grown tremendously from where they started. Senlin's arc over these books has been excellent: his growth from a diminutive school-teacher into a confident and impassioned leader while still retaining his core morality and principles. All while navigating the Tower of Babel, an entity notorious for grinding people down into shells of what they once were.

All Josiah Bancroft Reviews

The truth is, that the effort of giving endings to all these people, plots, and mysteries, places an extra burden on the story. And the fact that it carries on at a jaunty pace beneath all that is highly commendable. So this is one of the most divisive books that I have ever read. I guess I liked it a bit less than the other three, basically because I have some things I minorly didn't like, but I still enjoyed it quite a bit. I’m sure this review is just an unpopular opinion, I can already feel all the spoon of Bancroft's fans being raised, and I genuinely hope people love this book and series. But in my opinion, The Fall of Babel was utterly disappointing. I wanted to love it. I really do. I mean, I even reread the previous three books just to refresh my memory before I read The Fall of Babel so I can enjoy every detail of it. For those of you who don’t know, this is something that I rarely do due to my mountainous TBR pile, but I did it for The Books of Babel because I highly enjoyed the first three books. I chose this as the last fantasy book I read in 2021, it was one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and unfortunately, it ended up being the disappointment of the year. The reason we study and learn, the reason we take only what we need, is because we have all been given a great gift—the gift of civilization, the gift of understanding, the gift of mastery over our environment—and if we misuse these, if we take these things for granted, the ones who will suffer most are our sons and daughters. There is nothing wrong with enjoying the fruits of our ancestors’ labor. We should relish the pudding. But that privilege does not relieve us of our responsibility to be faithful custodians of the world we leave for our children.”

Senlin did not believe in that sort of love: sudden and selfish and insatiable. Love, as the poets so often painted it, was just bald lust wearing a pompous wig. He believed true love was more like an education: it was deep and subtle and never complete.” And then there is the minor issue of a non-decisive ending. It can be a good or bad thing, depending on your take on the whole series. Ultimately, the sequels will tell. Senlin is determined to find Marya, but to do so he’ll have to navigate madhouses, ballrooms, and burlesque theaters. He must survive betrayal, assassins, and the illusions of the Tower. But if he hopes to find his wife, he will have to do more than just endure. Special thanks to my Patrons on Patreon for giving me extra support towards my passion for reading and reviewing!

Customer reviews

Age-Gap Romance: Senlin and Marya have about ten years between them. They first met as Senlin first took over teaching duties at the village school. He asked them if they were from the East, and they responded with the name of a fishing village that was not far from Isaugh. They exchanged the usual nostalgia common to costal folk: sunrises, starfish, and the pleasant muttering of the surf at night, and then he asked, “You’ve come on holiday?” The book opens with a lengthy chunk of storytelling about Adam, who was separated from the rest of the characters at the end of ... book 2, I think, and was absent for book 3. But it's a really good bit of story that brings him to life, illuminates some mysteries, and introduces us to the top of the tower, where the story has always been wending its way. Naïve Newcomer: Every tourist to the Tower of Babel, and every new arrival to a new ringdom besides.