I'm glad to announce I have finished The Raven King a few days ago. It will be sad to see this characters go but in general I'm glad I managed to read this franchise this year. I found the best thing about all these four books to be the characters and their interactions and the sensorial writing of Maggie. So well, now regarding my specific thoughts of The Raven King.

Overall I'll say its a good book and I enjoyed it mostly, but I do believe it has more issues than the previous ones. I don't think it's a 'disappointing' ending as some people on Goodreads have said but it didn't left me completely satisfied either. I'll name why right now, as always, spoilers for this book.

If I didn't have any doubts about Adam being the best character before, this book confirms it. His ending was the one that most satisfied me and I'm so glad I got to know this character and watch him grow as much as he does. Sad to see him go but hoping future holds the best for him.

The fact that Glendower was a ruse caught me a bit off-guard and I thought it was a tad bit disappointing. Idk, I would have liked a better justification since I feel like all the investigations in the previous books were for nothing (so I kinda feel like I wasted my time). Thought I do like the sense of angst this brings on Gansey, since he proyected so much of his own identity on Glendower. For this I do understand that narrative desicion, but it still left a sour taste in my mouth.

I've seen a lot of complaints regarding Henry's character. Overall I like him, but I do agree he is rather forced into the story and he doesn't even do that much stuff. I feel Gansey's empathy towards him after the hole-scene was kinda forced (I really cannot believe he empathises more with him than with Adam or Ronan who he had known for a lot more time). I didn't like how Noah's booktime was sacrificed in order to show more of Henry, he is nice and all, but I would have liked a little bit more Noah in this book, at least to make his ending a bit more satisfying. I wasn't surprised that he finally disappeared from earth (I was expecting that) but the fact that we don't really see how his disappearance affects the boys after caring so much for him in the previous books is a bit nonsensical.

I'll say however that the thing that most bothered me were the secondary characters and their agency in the story. It reminded me a little bit of Rule of Wolves from the Grishaverse, in the fact that there are way too many POVs and the story branches more than it should, while handling the resolutions of these branches quite poorly. Neeve's conclusion was specially disappointing for me, I was glad she was finally back in the story and the way she died was quite... shitty. She was introduced as a very capable psychic, that yeah, wasn't sure what she was dealing with but I AT LEAST hoped she had done something more interesting regarding the Demon and Piper herself. She also has a disappointing ending, being shot by these Lamounier characters who were probably the most pointless part of the whole story and didn't really present anything interesting in their relationship with Piper. In general, most POVs regarding that auction and these characters were quite bad, I feel they could be excecuted a lot better, but they never really did have a huge agency, despite what one might think when reading their actions, they are presented as big threaths that barely clash with the main character's interests (I now can conclude that this is the biggest problem in all this franchise, and that it is a thing that Maggie isn't that good at writting, plot progression and urgency are really not her strong suit).

There weren't also any satisfying conclusions to the psychics of 300 Fox Way and the Gray Man, which I honestly would have liked to see adressed in the ending at least in a minimal way. Specially considering Blue is going away from Henrietta for the first time in their life, which would be very important for Maura and the rest of them.

I was not surprised at all by the fact that Gansey came back to life, I'm already pretty used to fiction throwing these things. It wouldn't have bothered me if he stayed dead (I do like my fair share of tragedy with characters I like) but I'm fine with his ending and I liked reading him in this book. Regarding Blue I liked her here and I liked the revelation about Artemus and herself, it was kinda cool, thought I would have liked her to do a little bit more stuff with that revelation.

Ronan was quite great in here! I really liked his POVs and his worries towards his family and friends and I'm glad he kinda reconcilled with Declan after so much time of tension. I'm sure that if I want more of him I'll someday pick the dreamer trilogy (right now to be honest I want to give this universe a break).

So well, regarding the "relationships" (or the ships, to be more honest) in these four books, I wanted to make a point about something that the ships in these story made me realize regarding how I do like my ships when consuming things. Overall I liked Gansey and Blue and Ronan and Adam, but I don't feel they really gave me OTP material. They work mostly because of how human they are and because one ends up enjoying to read their interactions, but in general I feel both their relationships lacked intensity and drama. And I don't mean drama in the cheap way of using clichés to add drama such as love triangles or miscommunication (I actually hate that), but I guess I just wanted a bit more tension in their scenes?? I felt this specially when Ronan kisses Adam for the first time in this book, the scene is fine, but I guess I would have expected a bit more awkwardness coming from both of them and a little bit more tension. Same with Blue and Gansey towards their realization for their feelings for one another, we do see Blue doubt about them but most of her issues come from the fact that she was kinda dating Adam, and then later she doesn't really question what she feels for Gansey, and viceversa. Which is quite surprising considering that the whole "You'll kill your true love when kissing them" it's a concept that does actually give tension to the relationship, but I guess that doesn't really add the flair I was looking for while reading this. Idk, I feel they lack the intensity that I'm looking for, unlike couples in books aimed for similar demographics like Six of Crows, Percy Jackson, or hell, even with very different stories that don't appeal to the YA audience at all, like Dune. However its fine for couples to be written like this, its just that they lack the factors that make me love a fictional couple.

Overall, I'm a bit sad to conclude this franchise but despite some little flaws I liked this journey quite a lot and I'm glad I read something I wanted to read for like three years.

Now some tierlists just for the hell of it:

I guess that if I have to make a top 5 for my fav characters, it goes as this.

1. Adam

2. Gansey

3. Persephone

4. Ronan

5. Noah

My ranking of the books (based of my enjoyment) is the following one:

1. Raven Boys

2. Blue Lily, Lily Blue

3. Dream Thieves

4. Raven King.

And that's all. Thank you all for accompanying me in my journey!