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One Rose Trilogy #3
The Eternal Rose
Kallista, now Reinine of all Adara, still has demons to seek out. She and her family journey south to her mate Obed's homeland in pursuit of the demon who absconded six years previously with Kallista's temple-bound ilian, Merinda, and her child. But when one of the godmarked dies, Kallista is devastated and her mates must cope without her. A trial by combat is needed to regain custody of a child and a new ninth godmarked must be located in order to make the magic whole again and powerful enough to defeat a truly formidable demon. But Kallista needs more than magic to heal her.
400 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 2007
3 people are currently reading
218 people want to read
About the author
Gail Dayton
25 books216 followersI've been a fan of fantasy, science fiction, fairy tales and other "books of wonder" since I was young enough, I still thought kissing was icky. Then I grew up and decided I liked a strong dose of romance in the mix.
I live on the Texas coast with my fella of 30-plus years, our youngest son (who should be graduating college this semester) and the granddog Dolly, a princess wussy pitbull mix who lets the cockapoo down the street beat her up.
I live on the Texas coast with my fella of 30-plus years, our youngest son (who should be graduating college this semester) and the granddog Dolly, a princess wussy pitbull mix who lets the cockapoo down the street beat her up.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
May 3, 2012
I was extremely disappointed by The Eternal Rose, and found myself wishing I had bought a physical copy so that I could throw it against the wall.
The racism/not-cleverly-hidden "White imperialism" and rampant sexual abuse made me want to scream.
I had been so pleased with the other One Rose books. The culture was interesting, the relationship styles were intriguing and despite the near-harem and forced style of the "Marked" illian, I was really drawn to the concept when it was mentioned in other places and when characters that WEREN'T Kallista talked about it.
But this book was just awful. It should contain rape warnings. Protip: "love" doesn't make nonconsensual sex okay!
And the message that the Southron people (who are amalgous to this world's equivalent of Islamic culture) have cruel practices and do bad things culturally because their culture has been corrupted by a demon for thousands of years is a very direct and offensive correlation to the real world.
The racism/not-cleverly-hidden "White imperialism" and rampant sexual abuse made me want to scream.
I had been so pleased with the other One Rose books. The culture was interesting, the relationship styles were intriguing and despite the near-harem and forced style of the "Marked" illian, I was really drawn to the concept when it was mentioned in other places and when characters that WEREN'T Kallista talked about it.
But this book was just awful. It should contain rape warnings. Protip: "love" doesn't make nonconsensual sex okay!
And the message that the Southron people (who are amalgous to this world's equivalent of Islamic culture) have cruel practices and do bad things culturally because their culture has been corrupted by a demon for thousands of years is a very direct and offensive correlation to the real world.
September 8, 2021
So a few things I like about this series include:
- The main protagonist is 34-40 across this series. A lot of times we get stories about women in their early 20s, which is fine, except that the lack of life experience shows in their interactions and it was just refreshing to have an older heroine.
- The series presents a positively represented poly relationship - meaning multiple people in one relationship. More representation of different kinds of relationships benefits everyone in the long term.
- The world is very well developed, and rich, and feels like a real place. So, great world building.
That being said, with this being the last book, I really felt like because the poly relationship was so large, and there were so many Ilian, that we lost a lot of chance for character development. I mean, across 3 books I read probably 1,000 or more pages of text and I still feel like the characters are shallow. All we get is a little back story, a little of the now, and nothing else. The characters have no interests, some of them have no fatal flaws, and I just felt like the story suffered for the size of the relationship. Not to mention the author [kinda spoiler alert] killed my favorite character in this book [/end spoiler]
I also felt like the whole portrayal of Daryath was so dark... they met like 4 people with the relationship turning out OK or positive - everyone else was all wicked and twisted and the whole society was presented as being amoral and without redemption. And we spent pretty much the whole book here, it got pretty depressing.
Then, Kallista was a bit of a whiny baby the whole time - of course at the end we find out why, but you still had to endure it. It took away some/most of the charm of an emotionally mature heroine.
As a whole, I'm glad I finished the series, but I just feel like the execution on this book needed work. Too much description of what council rooms looked like and not enough personality for the characters.
- The main protagonist is 34-40 across this series. A lot of times we get stories about women in their early 20s, which is fine, except that the lack of life experience shows in their interactions and it was just refreshing to have an older heroine.
- The series presents a positively represented poly relationship - meaning multiple people in one relationship. More representation of different kinds of relationships benefits everyone in the long term.
- The world is very well developed, and rich, and feels like a real place. So, great world building.
That being said, with this being the last book, I really felt like because the poly relationship was so large, and there were so many Ilian, that we lost a lot of chance for character development. I mean, across 3 books I read probably 1,000 or more pages of text and I still feel like the characters are shallow. All we get is a little back story, a little of the now, and nothing else. The characters have no interests, some of them have no fatal flaws, and I just felt like the story suffered for the size of the relationship. Not to mention the author [kinda spoiler alert] killed my favorite character in this book [/end spoiler]
I also felt like the whole portrayal of Daryath was so dark... they met like 4 people with the relationship turning out OK or positive - everyone else was all wicked and twisted and the whole society was presented as being amoral and without redemption. And we spent pretty much the whole book here, it got pretty depressing.
Then, Kallista was a bit of a whiny baby the whole time - of course at the end we find out why, but you still had to endure it. It took away some/most of the charm of an emotionally mature heroine.
As a whole, I'm glad I finished the series, but I just feel like the execution on this book needed work. Too much description of what council rooms looked like and not enough personality for the characters.
January 13, 2010
First of all, a big zero to Juno Books for the formatting of the ebook version of this novel. There are no chapter indexes at all, making navigating through the book difficult, sometimes there would be no spaces between words for a sentence or two and every so often the formatting would completely disappear, shoving everything into the same paragraph for a few pages until there was a section break in the story and it came right again. I found that incredibly frustrating and kept picking up my paper copy of the book to read that section (in this case I was very grateful to have both formats). For the record, I was reading the epub file I bought from Fictionwise. I don't know if other ebook formats have the same problems or not, but I was very unhappy with the version I have.
So that's my complaint about the production values, but what about the story?
I really enjoyed The Eternal Rose, finding it a more enjoyable read that The Barbed Rose and a fitting end to the series. I have to admit that I'm not exactly sure why it was this way. Some of the things that bothered me about the second book - most particularly the messy interpolitics of Kallista's ilian - remained in this one, but somehow it worked so much better for me.
The group finds themselves travelling to Obed's homeland to rescue Merinda and her son and are soon caught up in politics and dealing with demons once more. This book is set six years after the end of The Barbed Rose. Kallista has been Reinine of Adara for this time and settled well into the role, even if she still fells like she doesn't belong in it. After a magical assasination attempt that forces her to realise she has let her vigilance against the demons slip, they finally receive word of where Merinda might be and set of on a state visit to Daryath.
Adara's ilians are not accepted there, and they are forced to split themselves into the appearance of pairs in order not to offend their hosts. They all struggle with this, but most especially Obed, who found it hard to accept his place as one of a group in the first place and now, back in his homeland he finds himself slipping back into old, bad habits.
The book is told from the point of view of the Adarans and there is a certain feeling of superiority that their ways are best and the Daryathi are wrong and backward. On the whole, the reader can agree with this as I too disagree with the practice of slavery (mainly against Adarans in this case) and trial by combat. I can also accept that within the fantasy world created here it is better to let magic users work in the community than lock them away in a temple, but while I didn't like the Daryathi prejudice against the Adaran ilians, I also didn't like the Adaran assumption that they were totally right and the Daryathi totally wrong.
All the same, the developing problems within the ilian and their resolution was well done and interesting to read and I was totally involved in the story and wanted everything to work out well for all concerned.
The blurb on the back cover gives away one major plot point, so I guess I may as well address it here. One of Kallista's Godmarked is killed (I'm not going to say who or how) and while I was so sad that it happened, growing from the grief and devastation becomes another successful part of the story. Knowing this would happen, I felt it was pretty easy to pick out which character would be Godmarked to make the number back to the required nine, but the way not Kallista nor any of her remaining ilian see it worked perfectly within the context of the story and I liked that.
There's a lot of need for understanding between characters and even some long-standing issues are well resolved, especially between Obed and Torchay.
Kallista herself is a significant character in terms of self-development as well as plot in this book. There are a few hints early on that something might be wrong, all deftly slipped into her own POV sections where the reader is given a hint but Kallista is unable to pick up on it herself. This is developed nicely and it is only towards the end that she begins to realise what she is doing and where she is going wrong. She has never been perfect, and here her imperfections have been seized upon to weaken her. It is well done and I liked how it was resolved. Sure, it was a bit a case of one big personal revelation and all can start coming right, but this is fiction and there are only so many pages. I think Dayton did a good job.
I do feel a little sorry for the Daryathi, who end up having their entire society and way of life turned upside down by the arrival of Kallista and her family. But I also realise that the reader needs to remember that while it isn't spelled out very often, the One God/Goddess is a real entity in this world, not just something the people believe in. He/She is the driving force behind everything that happens in Daryath, not Kallista, who is simply His/Her conduit. So while, as I said, I feel sorry for the Daryathi, they had strayed from the right way according to the setup of the world (with some help) and the One chose to use Kallista to set things right.
This doesn't necessarily feel quite right to me, a real person in the real world where things are not that black and white, but Dayton makes it work within the world she has created.
This was a good, solid end to the series and I am very glad I finally finished the trilogy, even if it took me several years to get to do it. Dayton has told a good, solid and interesting story and I enjoyed reading it.
So that's my complaint about the production values, but what about the story?
I really enjoyed The Eternal Rose, finding it a more enjoyable read that The Barbed Rose and a fitting end to the series. I have to admit that I'm not exactly sure why it was this way. Some of the things that bothered me about the second book - most particularly the messy interpolitics of Kallista's ilian - remained in this one, but somehow it worked so much better for me.
The group finds themselves travelling to Obed's homeland to rescue Merinda and her son and are soon caught up in politics and dealing with demons once more. This book is set six years after the end of The Barbed Rose. Kallista has been Reinine of Adara for this time and settled well into the role, even if she still fells like she doesn't belong in it. After a magical assasination attempt that forces her to realise she has let her vigilance against the demons slip, they finally receive word of where Merinda might be and set of on a state visit to Daryath.
Adara's ilians are not accepted there, and they are forced to split themselves into the appearance of pairs in order not to offend their hosts. They all struggle with this, but most especially Obed, who found it hard to accept his place as one of a group in the first place and now, back in his homeland he finds himself slipping back into old, bad habits.
The book is told from the point of view of the Adarans and there is a certain feeling of superiority that their ways are best and the Daryathi are wrong and backward. On the whole, the reader can agree with this as I too disagree with the practice of slavery (mainly against Adarans in this case) and trial by combat. I can also accept that within the fantasy world created here it is better to let magic users work in the community than lock them away in a temple, but while I didn't like the Daryathi prejudice against the Adaran ilians, I also didn't like the Adaran assumption that they were totally right and the Daryathi totally wrong.
All the same, the developing problems within the ilian and their resolution was well done and interesting to read and I was totally involved in the story and wanted everything to work out well for all concerned.
The blurb on the back cover gives away one major plot point, so I guess I may as well address it here. One of Kallista's Godmarked is killed (I'm not going to say who or how) and while I was so sad that it happened, growing from the grief and devastation becomes another successful part of the story. Knowing this would happen, I felt it was pretty easy to pick out which character would be Godmarked to make the number back to the required nine, but the way not Kallista nor any of her remaining ilian see it worked perfectly within the context of the story and I liked that.
There's a lot of need for understanding between characters and even some long-standing issues are well resolved, especially between Obed and Torchay.
Kallista herself is a significant character in terms of self-development as well as plot in this book. There are a few hints early on that something might be wrong, all deftly slipped into her own POV sections where the reader is given a hint but Kallista is unable to pick up on it herself. This is developed nicely and it is only towards the end that she begins to realise what she is doing and where she is going wrong. She has never been perfect, and here her imperfections have been seized upon to weaken her. It is well done and I liked how it was resolved. Sure, it was a bit a case of one big personal revelation and all can start coming right, but this is fiction and there are only so many pages. I think Dayton did a good job.
I do feel a little sorry for the Daryathi, who end up having their entire society and way of life turned upside down by the arrival of Kallista and her family. But I also realise that the reader needs to remember that while it isn't spelled out very often, the One God/Goddess is a real entity in this world, not just something the people believe in. He/She is the driving force behind everything that happens in Daryath, not Kallista, who is simply His/Her conduit. So while, as I said, I feel sorry for the Daryathi, they had strayed from the right way according to the setup of the world (with some help) and the One chose to use Kallista to set things right.
This doesn't necessarily feel quite right to me, a real person in the real world where things are not that black and white, but Dayton makes it work within the world she has created.
This was a good, solid end to the series and I am very glad I finally finished the trilogy, even if it took me several years to get to do it. Dayton has told a good, solid and interesting story and I enjoyed reading it.
March 6, 2017
See book one if you are in a state of panic and need a review from me...a person you don't know.
October 4, 2019
The first bit of the book was slow and then the death happened and I didn’t want to read for a bit, but it all came together nicely.
August 12, 2021
The ending left me entirely unsatisfied. It felt like like there was so much more story left to go and then it was just... Over.
April 23, 2011
The only reason this is not a five star is because I was so traumatized by certain things that happen to certain favorite characters (ok one really but I'm trying to be vague and unspoilery). Not that bad things equal a bad book - it makes it more real for me a lot of the time. But this time, said bad thing stuck with me the whole way through. I never got over it before the book ended so it left a bit of a taint. If you are not the type of reader who gets overly attached to characters and also enjoyed the previous two books, then you will like this one too. Promise. If you are already attached to any of the characters, particularly fun likable ones, prepare yourself because you are not going to like where this is going at first. Hopefully, you keep reading after the event and are not the type of reader who will just stop in protest of unpleasantness. The book stays kinda wrapped around the bad event I'm alluding to but that's because it is important. So keep reading (possibly with tissues nearby) and it will get better again. There's still going to be that HEA feeling to the end.
January 10, 2025
TW: SA, Racism
This is a fun series and I love these characters but this book was a miss. I will recommend this to friends as a duology.
The concept of this book sounds like a great choice for the end of this series. Exploring a territory that’s been exposed to demons over long term and seeing the effects? Cool idea. BUT, the execution was rough. It came across lacking nuance and pretty racist.
“But people aren’t reading this for plot. This is a character led series.” Ok, that makes it even more frustrating that beloved characters make decisions that read like SA and are… not seen that way by the other characters.
Also I don’t think anyone wanted an “Obed Regresses into his old jealous patterns” arc. I certainly didn’t.
This is only rated as high as it is because the character relationships and banter that we know and love are still strong in most of this book. Seeing the Ilian well established with unique relationships forged over time, including to their children, is cute.
Do yourself a favour, just call it after book 2
This is a fun series and I love these characters but this book was a miss. I will recommend this to friends as a duology.
The concept of this book sounds like a great choice for the end of this series. Exploring a territory that’s been exposed to demons over long term and seeing the effects? Cool idea. BUT, the execution was rough. It came across lacking nuance and pretty racist.
“But people aren’t reading this for plot. This is a character led series.” Ok, that makes it even more frustrating that beloved characters make decisions that read like SA and are… not seen that way by the other characters.
Also I don’t think anyone wanted an “Obed Regresses into his old jealous patterns” arc. I certainly didn’t.
This is only rated as high as it is because the character relationships and banter that we know and love are still strong in most of this book. Seeing the Ilian well established with unique relationships forged over time, including to their children, is cute.
Do yourself a favour, just call it after book 2
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 20, 2009
Third and final chapter in the Rose Trilogy that follows Kallista Varyl and the various members of her ilian. Dayton tries to tie up the loose ends from the previous two parts of this fascinating trilogy as the intricate family unit searches both for the child that resulted from the brief liason between Fox, Stone and healer Merinda and the demon influences in Obed's homeland, Daryath. As usual, Kallista threatens to disrupt entire societies while striving to fulfill her destiny as the God-Chosen and protect her Adaran homeland as well as the disparate individuals that make up her immediate family.
December 22, 2008
Stunning conclusion to the trilogy. I cried. It is so worth the read, all 3 books are well written and so involved. The ending is logical snd un-forced. I can't say enough good things about this series.
January 11, 2016
I was so disappointed by the last book in this trilogy! Everything I loved from the first book is not in this one and everything I didn't like is in.
April 6, 2008
Once again, an excellent read.
Those who are against polyamory probably wouldn't like this series.
Those who are against polyamory probably wouldn't like this series.
January 28, 2009
I loved the way this ended. How wonderful is the power of love. Good Job! Gail! Keep the stories coming.
April 26, 2009
If you've read the first two, the sad news is that this one doesn't really measure up, but is nevertheless a decent read, especially if you're interested in finishing the trilogy.
Read
January 9, 2010Poly,significant death
December 20, 2012
re-read Dec 2012
July 6, 2016
I enjoyed this book. I feel that the best book in the series was the first book but this one was quite emotional and tied up the loose ends. All and all, decent plot and good resolution.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews