by Edith Pattou
First sentence: “I had placed the box, the one etched with the runes that contained the story of Rose and her white bear, in a quiet corner of my library.”
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Others in the series: East
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Release date: October 23, 2018
Content: There are some intense moments, and the main character is married with a baby, so it may not interest younger readers much. It will be in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

When I finished this — and don’t get me wrong: I loved it — I thought, “Well, that’s the best unnecessary sequel I’ve ever read.”  See: East (which I also loved) ended satisfyingly. Rose and the White Bear (spoilers, if you haven’t read it or don’t know the fairy tale) got their happily ever after. There was, really, no need for there to ever be a sequel.

And yet, here we are.

It’s two years after the end of East, and Rose and Charles are happy. They have an adopted daughter, Estelle, and a baby, temporarily named Winn. They have a good life in Fransk. Then they decide to go visit Rose’s parents, traveling separately, and Charles never makes it. Word comes that he died in a huge storm. But Rose determines that, no, he’s still alive, and her old arch-enemies, the Trolls, are behind it. So she takes off — leaving Estelle and Winn in the care of her family — to rescue her White Bear. Again.

It really was an enjoyable read, but I just couldn’t shake the whole unnecessary side of it. Why did Rose need to go again? I understand wanting to revisit this world that Pattou created, but I really didn’t need a rehashing of Rose’s story. It it, instead, had followed Neddy (which it did, for a bit, and I really liked those parts) or Estelle (and made it a really young adult book, rather than this weird feels-like-a-young-adult-but-the-main-character-is-an-adult book) I might have liked it more. Pattou couldn’t have even come up with a new antagonist; she had to resurrect the Troll Queen again. So, yeah, while Pattou’s writing is lovely, and the story is nice enough, it’s really all… unnecessary.

Though I suppose there will be fans who are grateful for it.