Reticence by Gail Carriger
(The Custard Protocol #4)
Steampunk, Fantasy, Paranormal, Adult
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Synopsis
Bookish and proper Percival Tunstell finds himself out of his depth when floating cities, spirited plumbing, and soggy biscuits collide in this delightful conclusion to NYT bestselling author Gail Carriger’s The Custard Protocol series.

Percival Tunstell loves that his sister and her best friend are building themselves a family of misfits aboard their airship, The Spotted Custard. Of course, he’d never admit that he belongs among them. He’s always been on the outside — dispassionate, aloof, and hatless. But accidental spies, a trip to Japan, and one smart and beautiful doctor may have him renegotiating his whole philosophy on life.

Except hats. He’s done with hats. Thank you very much.

Read-along
Midway through 2018, I decided that I wanted to read the books from Gail Carriger’s Parasolverse in chronological order. This led me to start the journey of the Parasolverse Read-Along in August 2018. If you would like more information about the read-along please visit my post about it here. At the beginning of each month, I will have a brief read-along post go up letting you know what the book for that month is.

What I thought
Since this is the last book, in the third series, in this world I will be as vague as possible so I don’t spoil a lot of what happens just in case you would like to go back to the beginning and start from there.  With that said there are somethings that I spoil because there is no way to put something down without telling you something.

If you have been following my journey with this read-along to this point you know this is a bittersweet ending for me. I love this author’s books and I look forward to all that she has coming in this universe in the future. No matter how I am feeling these books always put a smile on my face and over the last year and a half these books have helped me through some tough times. For that, I will always be glad that I began this journey and I am sad to see it end but be sure I will continue to review anything she puts out in this world.

To date, there are three completed series and multiple novellas all within this world, the Parasolverse. This book is the perfect ending to this series and this Era.  Everything wraps up so well and yet leaves the author room to expand if she wants to in the future.

As much as Competence is about Prim, this story is about Percy. Oh, our Percy has no interest in romance Percy only needs his books and to have his papers recognized within the scientific community to be happy. He tends to not even notice all the attention that he gets from the other sex to their frustration. I did not realize how much I wanted a Percy love story until I read this book.  It was everything that I did not know I needed, and I am so glad that it exists. Percy finds his match in Arsenic, whose mother we know from the Finishing School series. Oh, and guess who we see…Prim and Percy’s Aunt Softy AKA Sophronia!!!! Yes, there are connections through the three different series.  I would love to have the time to sit down and map them all out.  At the beginning of this story, you see all these women sitting at a table talking and I just squealed. Really, I squealed. This book brought everyone together. It just wrapped up everything so well, which seemed right being the story ends at the end of the Victorian Era. So, I am going to assume we may have reached the end of the timeline but that does not mean we aren’t going to get novellas about the characters.

This book starts with a very pregnant Rue and Quesnel getting married, they are holding interviews for a doctor on board the Spotted Custard due to Rue’s condition.  With all the trouble they seem to get themselves in Prim is right in forcing this issue.  Where would Rue be without Prim watching out for her? The last doctor they see that day is Arsenic and is everything they could have hoped for, she passed their “test” without flinching, what they did not expect was that she would steal Percy’s heart as well.  I know that this book ends at the end of the Victorian Era, so I know the likelihood a series about Rue’s and possibly Percy’s children is unlikely but I so want it. The descriptions of the floating city in Japan was so beautifully written the description was just so magical.  I loved the shifters that we see in this book and I feel like if she wanted to the author could expand on those too.  There are so many possibilities for future books and I am here for all of it.

My Rating: /5Follow me on other platforms:
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