chayote reviewed God of Endings by Jacqueline Holland
Review of 'God of Endings' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
The God of Endings by Jacqueline Holland is a dark fantasy, beautifully written, and told over two timelines. We follow Anna in 1986, going by the name Collette and running an elite preschool in New York, and Anna in 1830 as a child at the end of her mortal life and then throughout the decades of her life as a vampire. Her life is a brutal one, filled with the many cruelties of the world, and these things are often depicted in crushing detail.
Some character depictions fell a little flat for me as a character-driven reader, and a couple one-off side characters felt a little questionable entirely. There are some lore elements that were mentioned almost offhand and never revisited that left me slightly baffled1. The main issue for me as a reader were certain character decisions which I could not make sense of. I understand a bad decision …
The God of Endings by Jacqueline Holland is a dark fantasy, beautifully written, and told over two timelines. We follow Anna in 1986, going by the name Collette and running an elite preschool in New York, and Anna in 1830 as a child at the end of her mortal life and then throughout the decades of her life as a vampire. Her life is a brutal one, filled with the many cruelties of the world, and these things are often depicted in crushing detail.
Some character depictions fell a little flat for me as a character-driven reader, and a couple one-off side characters felt a little questionable entirely. There are some lore elements that were mentioned almost offhand and never revisited that left me slightly baffled1. The main issue for me as a reader were certain character decisions which I could not make sense of. I understand a bad decision here and there, but these simply made no sense to me, coming from a centuries-old vampire with some level of experience. Because of the absent reasoning, followed by the brutality of the outcome, it felt too much like the author’s hand coming through the story to insert shock-value and horror artificially2.
Aside from those few parts this was a compelling story full of emotion and atmosphere and a rather enjoyable read. I found myself engaged by the writing despite having little inkling of where things were headed at any point. The 480 pages read surprisingly quickly, and the ending was fitting for the story told. Anna, never having wanted to become a vampire and immortal, struggles with her immortality, with the pain of getting attached to mortal places and people, but also her deeply ingrained humanity and desire for a home and community. She is naturally kind and caring, and wants desperately to protect herself from the loss that comes with caring for things more fleeting than herself.
Overall this book is a slow, often sad, tale of a vampire who never wanted to live forever and does not know what to do with immortality. I’d recommend it to readers who enjoy dark fantasy, who are not turned away by grisly scenes of tragedy, and enjoy a fairly slow pace with atmospheric writing. Fans of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue may enjoy this one, or if your favorite character from Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles was Louis.
