I have so many feelings.

3.5 rounded to 4 stars.

Though Empire of Gold, is too weighed down by its extensive mythology like earlier volumes and only resolves with several deus ex machina, it weaves enough elements from the prior books (along with a number of big reveals) to be a reasonably satisfying conclusion to the trilogy.

The book picks up immediately where Kingdom of Copper leaves off, so I recommend rereading KoC if it's been awhile or at least leafing through the glossary in the back (which I only found after finishing the book).

Daevabad is in chaos following the attack from Manizheh's forces. Nahri and Ali find themselves stranded in Egypt. This results in a bifurcation of the plot with POVs from Dara in Daevabad and Nahri and Ali, who are traveling together. The non-Western setting is what initially drew me to the book (and in my opinion is the star of the show), and it's still present here, especially with the sumptuous descriptions of buildings, clothing, and food.

To me, the main struggle in this book is about identity-- primarily Ali coming to terms with his mysterious connection to the marid (and more subtly, learning how to work with and understand others, continued from the last book) and Dara's internal war with his conscience and the words of his Banu Nahida. After finishing the last novel, without spoilers, I think it's clear that Dara and Ali are set up to be counterpoints to each other. They're both confused men with troubled pasts (albeit VERY different scales of trouble) who grew up in extremely hierarchical settings where they were expected to obey. They both struggle with who they want to be and the roles others put them in. They both take long journeys with Nahri, and they both fall in love with her.

Some other themes from the earlier books also are emphasized:
Violence begets violence
Two wrongs don't make a right
No plan survives contact with the enemy, and your enemy is likely to be just as motivated and clever as you are
Despite personal risk and futility, we must stand up for what we believe is right

I really struggled to keep up with various groups and political entities in the first novel, and it gets even worse in #3-- there aren't more players, but there's no refresher exposition and the glossary in the back is of limited use since it doesn't focus on just the key important characters. I really wanted a short summary at the beginning!

I found myself rereading City of Brass and Kingdom of Copper as soon as I finished Empire of Gold because I felt like I wasn't doing justice to the book as a reader with so little remembered context. The refresher certainly helped-- I was able to let the unimportant names flow past me like the world-building asides they really were. Rereading the books also made me absolutely fall in love with the setting again.

The experience of rereading also gave me fresh insight on Dara as a character. Most of the fan fiction on AO3 is devoted to him and Nahri, which baffled me. When I originally read CoB, Dara seemed like a deconstruction of your typical alpha male romance hero. Not only is he bad at communicating, he's REAL bad at it. He's beautiful, but also a jerk who's rather racist. He doesn't just have a past, he's responsible for slaughtering thousands of innocents. In short, ideal male lead on the surface, but highly troubling at every level.

As I reread the trilogy, I realized how much we see Dara struggling to do the right thing but always making a critical mistake somewhere-- believing what his masters tell him, not turning his counsel into action, not taking critical players into confidence, trusting a suspicious ally, and so on. Most of these issues and most of the positive things he does are based on the same thing: loyalty before all. It means he obeys his masters even when he vehemently disagrees, but it also means he'll rush into danger to save one of his soldiers. He truly wants to fix the world but keeps doing the same thing. The definition for insanity is of course doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. It makes it painful to watch, and I don't think we get the satisfaction of seeing Dara learn from his mistakes until very late. It makes him a tragic, frustrating figure-- we get to see him struggle internally, but his attempts to prevent further wrongdoing are never enough.

To contrast, our very first interactions with Ali in book 1 show he's already willing to compromise his loyalty to do what's right. While he refines this and mellows a bit during the books to be less of an ass, I don't think we see nearly as much internal character growth. The text really works hard to endear him to readers, and some elements were frankly charming (like in Kingdom of Copper where he includes a beautiful Egyptian-themed office for Nahri in the hospital). I'm not opposed to a main character having a flat character arc, but it's unsatisfying when compared to Dara.

So, in conclusion, I don't know. I love the setting. I really enjoyed a lot of the characters. I'm still frustrated, in large measure because there's so much good stuff here. Perhaps too much good stuff. But I have immense gratitude to the author for introducing us to this world, giving us an ending, and setting me off on an honestly rather pleasurable analysis paralysis.

Thanks so much to NetGalley for a review copy of this book, the end of this terrific trilogy!  I was already certain to buy it, but I"m so glad I got to find out what happened!!!  And there was a lot!  This really ended with a bang as so much happened I could hardly catch my breath.  I think this is a fantasy series that is going to have to go down in the future as one that must be read to understand the evolution of the genre.  Great stuff.  Kudos to the author, this was fantastic and immensely entertaining reading.

There are not enough stars on the rating scale to give this grand finale to the Daevabad Trilogy.

I'll be short and to the point: this book was phenomenal.  I started this series with little expectations, and I devoured books one and two in about two days.  I knew that this series had the ability to become one of my favorite series of all time.  And S. A. Chakraborty did not disappoint.

This story was bittersweet, sometimes hard to read.  It was raw, it examined people's darkest desires--the lengths they would go to to protect those they love and gain control.  It was heartbreaking, wholesome, and beautiful.  Nahri has been my favorite character since book one, and I think Ali has taken her spot with Nahri being a very, very close second.

The amount of character development given to every single character, not just the main three, was staggering.  All of the pieces so carefully strewn throughout the other two stories finally come together in this, building up everyone into their epitome, either as good or bad.  The backstory and explanations we readers have been expecting was flawlessly delivered and added so much to the already-excellent story.  Especially when it came to discovering Nahri's past and secrets regarding her birth.  Her last chapter, the one right before the epilogue, had me tearing up because it meant so much for her character to finally get the answers she had been wanting.

I cannot recommend this series enough, and I am beyond excited for my next reread.

I LOVED this book, absolutely and completely. When reading the first two books, I fell in love with the characters; Nahri, Ali and Dara were the greatest love triangle, but were also supported by other amazing characters like Jamshid, Muntadhir and Fiza, and . When I saw the third book come across my net galley feed, I was worried. Most times, authors who do a trilogy seem to lose themselves and their characters at the end. Chakraborty does not. She builds them up even more so than she did in the first two books. I had no idea how it was going to end, but I'm so glad she completed it the way she did. I can officially say that the Daevabad Trilogy will forever be one of my favorite sets of books. If you need any sort of magical transportation into another land so similar but so different from our own, than I highly recommend you seek out this trilogy. You will not be disappointed.

A satisfying and electric finish to a series that captivated me from the very first pages. Enough has been said about S. A. Chakraborty's ability to bring a rich, fantastical world to life with beautiful details and fascinating and complex characters, but that won't stop me from saying it all over again. A truly tremendous reading experience, a satisfying ending, and a world that readers will want to get lost in makes this book and series a must read for fantasy fans.

I have been waiting for this book to come out for a long time. I was THRILLED with it. In the past I have found that series tend to weaken over time, or seem to be manufactured to keep a story going that ought to have ended after the first book. This series, however, was brilliant from the first page to the last. The story-telling and world building were incredible, the pace excellent, and the characters compelling and unique. I cannot recommend this book highly enough!