The Final Gambit (The Inheritance Games #3)

The Final Gambit Book Review by Jennifer Lynn Barnes 

This book was so bad, but I loved it anyway. 

It was like witnessing a slow moving, inevitable car-crash. Or watching a new episode of The Bachelor. Same thing. 

In many ways, this book was poorly written, terribly developed, too fast-paced, lacked characterization, missed depth, and was laughably ridiculous. 

However, I found it so entertaining. 

The Final Gambit is the third and final installment in The Inheritance Game trilogy. If you go back and read my previous reviews on the first two, many of my critiques are the same for the third. 

This concluding novel solves the final mystery of Avery Kylie Grambs, who became the sole inheritor of Tobias Hawthorne’s fortune of billions in the first novel. Along with the billions, Avery also received death threats, myriad enemies, puzzles upon riddles, and complicated relationships with the four Hawthorne brothers: Nash, Grayson, Jameson, and Xander. 

I won’t describe the first two books in detail because that would take forever (and if you’re reading this, you probably already have some idea of what’s going on). 

This book immediately picks up where the last book left off. The overarching mystery of why Tobias Hawthorne picked Avery over his four grandsons to become his inheritor influences every other mystery the book presents. It finally gets solved as Avery and company work through the final puzzle. 

Without a doubt, the best part of this book are the puzzles. Without it, this book is nothing. They’re not even particularly clever or well-written, but they are fun. This book, perhaps more than any other, has made me realize how far and how successful a book can be based on a titillating plot alone. 

The riddles involve chess sequences, twisting hidden handles, allusions to biblical passages, vintage wines, words etched in gems, and breaking into tombs. The riddles, along with the incredibly short chapters, keep you going as a reader, even though it’s a detriment to the story as a whole. 

For example, there were places and scenes that Barnes really should have written out and shown to the readers and just…didn’t. The whole beginning with Jameson taking Avery out for her birthday was simply summarized and never actually shown. This is a terrible choice as a writer as it takes away any hint or flavor of nuance from the plot and characters. 

Even Jennifer Lynn Barnes seems to be aware that the puzzles and mystery are the best parts of her novel as anything else she focuses on, fails utterly. Her characters are unbelievably weak, unimportant, and all blend together. 

Avery has no characterization other than being unrealistically altruistic and intelligent. This is a complete shame considering she’s the main character and we’ve spent hundreds of pages in her head. 

Her sister doesn’t matter at all. I can’t even recall her name one day later which is just pathetic. Avery’s best friend Max shouldn’t be in the story. I actually have no idea why she is other than Barnes trying to show that Avery has friends outside of her feeble romances. Barnes doesn’t even do it successfully as Max plays no crucial role in any way shape or form. 

 The four brothers probably have the most characterization, which is deplorably sad seeing as they’re as one dimensional as a sheet of paper. Even at the end of book three, I can hardly tell Jameson and Grayson apart which is a huge problem. 

Jameson’s only defining characteristic is that he’s hungry (which Barnes reminds you of a hundred times) and that Grayson wants to be perfect, but isn’t. Also Grayson has icy-colored eyes. Barnes never lets you forget that. Nash continues to be a ridiculous cowboy for no apparent reason and Xander’s cheer and extroversion make him as complex as a cookie. 

Other characters including extended members of the Hawthorne family, the Laughlin family, and Thea and Rebecca are so unimportant and forgettable that I won’t even discuss them further. 

The characters in The Final Gambit Do. Not. Matter. At. All. At all, at all. I can’t stress this enough. If Barnes didn’t already have a horde of nameless characters, she decided to add more to the shapeless batch in this novel. 

Arguably, two of the biggest characters she introduced were Eve, granddaughter of Tobias Hawthrone, and Vincent Blake, supposedly Tobias Hawthorne’s greatest enemy and yet no one we have ever heard about before in any of the novels. 

These characters were…lame. That’s the best word I can use to describe them. Barnes needed a big bad for the last novel which just so happened to be Vincent Blake—another intelligent, cocky old man that underestimates Avery because she’s young and female. 

Barnes’ characters are so…bad. They lack any depth, complexity, growth, or development. The relationships between any and all of them was paltry at best. Barnes tries really hard to make you as a reader think they matter and that they’re super convoluted with deep emotional ties. 

They’re not. 

I can’t say anything else more about the characters than I already have. Apart from the characters (or lack thereof), the other aspect of the book I found inadequate was Barnes’ writing itself. It read as very juvenile, simplistic, and repetitive. 

Now, I’m not saying you have to be Shakespeare in order to be a good writer. 

Benjamin Alire Sáenz, for example, author of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe is an incredible writer that uses very basic language. And yet, every chapter of his packs a punch of emotion and heart. 

Barnes’ writing does not. 

It doesn’t pack anything at all except to explain herself a million times over and over again and tell us that Grayson has gray eyes and a stiff body. 

The amount of times she would repeat certain lines from her own story aggravated me to the nth degree. It was incredibly annoying and also needlessly useless. It made the book longer than it needed to be and she would also flashback to things that literally just happened. 

Absurd. 

I’ve complained a lot about this book, but like I said at the beginning, I still found it enjoyable despite myself. Normally, every single aspect of this book would make me hate it. Because it’s so fun and entertaining to try and solve the puzzles and watch them unfold though, the book overall gets a wobbly thumbs up from me. 

Just keep in mind that fun is all this book has to offer. 

The second you want more from the characters, plot, or development, you will be disappointed. 

Recommendation: Barnes really should write crossword puzzles for The Washington Post with all of her riddles and puzzles and clues. Books? Not so much. 

Score: 7/10 (really should be a 6, but you saw why above).