The Inheritance Games Series

AUTHOR: Jennifer Lynn Barnes

BOOKS IN SERIES:

The Inheritance Games    Nominee for Best Young Adult Fiction (2020)

The Hawthorne Legacy     Nominee for Best Young Adult Fiction (2021)

The Final Gambit     Goodreads Choice Award for Young Adult Fiction (2022)

GENRE: YA Thriller

RATING: 3/5

COVER ART: Katt Phatt

COVER DESIGN: Karina Granda

CONVINCING YOU TO READ THIS IN 6 WORDS: Found Family, Amazing riddles, Heiress to the fortune, Romance, Suspense and betrayals

Everything’s a game, Avery Grambs. The only thing we get to decide in this life is if we play to win.

SUMMARY:

Avery Grambs was living a normal life of crisis and trying make her ends meet. But when billionaire Tobias Hawthorne dies and makes Avery as his heiress, everything changes. Especially since Avery had no clue of his existence. But the mystery of who Tobias is or was is just one of the many secrets had unravel as she reaches the Hawthorne mansion.

As the riddles start popping up, secrets start to spill and slowly past betrayals and sacrifices also come to light. While, they are just trying to keep up with their life, the past haunts them and it comes down to Avery how she wants to live and what will she do with each secret.

(The summary is very generic as to not spoil either book for you. Unlike other of my reviews, this is not an individual book review but rather a series overview.)

The trick to being abandoned was to never let yourself long for anyone who left.

MY THOUGHTS:

I will not lie; I read this series for two reasons. One hype and one the beautiful cover. I will not lie; I mean, look at those covers. They call you out. The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes is a YA thriller full of ups and downs, secrets and sacrifices that will keep you on your toes. And while I enjoyed them, they were only partially successful for me. Let’s break everything into details now, shall we? The Inheritance Games series is now divided into three books and one novella. The series takes a fantastic twist on the common notion or fantasy we all have at least once. What if someone leaves me an inheritance of a lot of money?

I enjoyed the main plot of the series. The best part of the series was the riddles and the hidden clues that came on the way. Each of them was well-crafted and engaging. And I must admit, it was fun, too, trying to figure them out. The emotional aspect added was predictable at times and yet not dull. Now, when I say the dynamic element, it does not refer to romance. The romance in the series was not the best. The love triangle didn’t make sense and was there to add tension and unnecessary angst. Don’t get me wrong, I love angst, but I didn’t feel it…like I couldn’t connect it emotionally.

The characters were stereotypical at times and yet not too dull to read. I enjoyed some dynamics, especially how they all were slowly related to each other. More than that, I wanted just the riddles. Do you know how they saw the journey rather than the destination? That is what it is for me. The ending of the series disappointed me so much. I think I am done with selfless female characters giving away their powers or wealth to save others or for others. I have read so much about it that I am tired. It is a personal preference, and not everyone will have the same opinion.

There is one thing that I am not a fan of: destroying characters and their personalities for a specific ending, and ding…ding…ding… that is what happened. I try to avoid naming characters throughout the reviews to avoid the spoilers, but if you know…you know.

Overall, I enjoyed the world and the writing. I had some problems with the characters, and I didn’t find romance a lot. They were just put together, and suddenly, two brothers like her. Nope, it’s not my cup of tea. And the ending. That ending was the main reason I had a bad experience with the series.

This series is also a little age-bound. The younger me would have enjoyed the book, but this me, nope.

So, fans of YA and romance may enjoy this book. But people who want more content, and I need to figure out how to put it but substance, may not find this enjoyable.

The world is the board, Heiress. We just have to keep rolling the dice.”

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You can read the review for The World Breaker Requiem by Luke Tarzian here.

You can read the review for The Memoirs of Elikai: The Children of the Solstice by D. Alexander here