Personal Response: I enjoyed reading Sons of Destiny by Darren O'Shaughnessy. The book and the twelve part series was full of lots of suspense and fear and overall left me on the edge of my seat unable to stop turning the pages.

Plot: Darren learned that Darius is his nephew and no longer wanted to kill the boy. He was unsure of what other options he had, so he took Darius back to his home and explained everything to his estranged sister. She was unsure of him at first; eventually, she believed him. With some council from Vancha, he decided to attempt to blood Darius which is a dangerous move that could have left both of them dead. The operation was a success even though they are both sick and Darius is unconscious. He sends Darius and his mother off to a safer place under the care of other vampires. After regrouping, they decided they must go back to the circus after they found out the police surrounded it. When they arrived, they realized that Steve and his army of vampets and vampaneze were waiting for them inside. Alice goes and talks to the other officers and finds out that there was a path that they could use to get into the circus. They made their way into the complex. Off in the distance, they see Steve and his army waiting for them with two of their friends tied up next to them. They all realized that this is where they are destined to fight for the last time and should prepare to fight to the death.

Characterization: Darren was the main character in Sons of Destiny. Throughout the book and the series, he changed greatly. Overall, the biggest change was his thirst for battle and bloodshed. He also greatly matured throughout this book due to him having to make many hard decisions. He had many moments in the book where his evil side comes out and he does questionable things. He often fought them off but not always. These are the first time in the whole series he had ever done anything evil.

Another character who changed greatly in this book is Debbie. She is Darren's girlfriend and had changed the most throughout the book and the series. In the first half of the book, she was not in it because Darren and Harkat left to find Harkat souls. After they met back up with her, she had changed in both physical and emotional ways. She raised an army when they were gone and had become a strong leader. She also had become physically stronger and got training with firearms and hand to hand combat.

Setting: Most of the book took place in Darren’s hometown. The town's name was never said. Based off different things said in the book, the town is probably a larger suburb. The book took place during the 20th century because they had cars and used modern technology like cell phones. This was important to the storyline because modern technology made it harder for the vampires to adapt into human life. Because of this, there were many times throughout the book they had to work around the modern technology like cameras. A large portion of the book also took place in a future wasteland where they were transported to by Desmond Tiny. After he died in the wasteland, Darrens soul was trapped in “The Lake of Souls” which was up in the mountains of the wasteland.

Thematic Connection: The main themes in Sons of Destiny is Death and Courage. These are the main themes because the book had a lot of death and people sacrificing themselves for the greater good of the world. Courage is another theme because the characters had to do dangerous things that could and usually did result in them dying.

Recommendation: I recommend this book to anyone who is above the age of 11 because there are very graphic portrayals of death and a lot of fighting. I would also recommend this book to both boys and girls because the themes within the book are universal that both genders can follow.

The time of reckoning has arrived for Darren Shan. He’s finally going to meet his destiny with Steve Leopard. There are only two possible outcomes for this heated ending; Steve kills him and becomes Lord of the Shadows, or worse, Darren kills Steve and he becomes Lord of the Shadows and brings the world to its knees to face its ruin. Join Darren in his final stand against the vampaneze and Steve Leopard in Sons of Destiny.

Plot

Sons of Destiny is the wrapping up of a plot that started in Tunnels of Blood with the introduction of the vampaneze. There were slight detours along the way, like in Trials of Death and The Lake of Souls, but the vampires versus vampaneze was the overall plot of the series. Honestly, it was a good and unique idea to have these two different nocturnal blood-drinkers fighting against each other instead of the normal vampires versus werewolves (which don’t make a lick of sense).

The overall plot in the Cirque du Freak series was concluded in Sons of Destiny and it… really fell flat. Is the ending different? Yes. Is it interesting? You bet it is. Is it good? Not necessarily. It was a good cop-out ending. It was good, yes, nobody is denying that, but it was still a cop-out and I can’t help but feel cheated by it. I don’t have a problem with what happened with Darren at the very, very end, but the whole talk about destiny and how the characters didn’t really decide what to do by themselves irked me. I liked the original idea that Darren was an ordinary child who, through an extraordinary string of events, got to where he was in the last book. Instead we find out this is not the case and it’s a bit cheap.

I’ve said in previous reviews of different books that I don’t like prophecies, and my feelings about the ending of Sons of Destiny encapsulate exactly why I don’t like them. When you have prophecies the characters don’t have their own agency. Everything they think they are deciding to do was actually predetermined for them so that they could fill some prophecy. It makes the sacrifices, pain, and growth that a character goes through feel unimportant.

Writing

Even though I didn’t care much for the ending of Sons of Destiny I can never deny that Darren Shan is a good writer. He describes things so well, especially action scenes. Unfortunately, he’s shown that discussions of time and paradoxes are not his forte. Besides that, he writes superbly. I especially liked the way that Darren, the character’s, writing changed as he got older. The details Shan gives are wonderful but not too overbearing. There’s never really too much or too little description given for something.

One complaint is that he does have a bad habit of info dumping. Every book Darren rehashed what took place in the previous books and as the series came closer to the end this meant there was a lot of info dumping. I really don’t know why. The books aren’t all that long so there was really no reason for Darren to remind us that certain things had happened.

Characters

Up to a certain point, I liked Darren Shan. He was a smart child who thought outside of the box and made the most of the situations he was in. But as the series went on, Darren, who was an adult in every way except physically, still acted like a child. He was twenty-something years old at one point yet still made silly decisions like he would have made in the beginning of the series. His character also took a sudden shift in Lord of the Shadows. He all of a sudden was supposed to be this creature hell-bent on revenge. This sudden shift wasn’t in character at all and was only done so that Darren couldn’t turn away from his destiny as Lord of the Shadows. Darren started off as a likeable character who became less likable when he continued to act like a child in his adulthood, and then his characterization took a sharp turn and he wasn’t the character the reader learned to love.

The other characters, besides Harkat Mulds, weren’t developed as much as they should have been. The reader is told of how close they were to Darren but it was never really shown. Even Darren’s relationship with Mr. Crepsley wasn’t as deep as it should’ve been. I can appreciate the characters that weren’t Harkat or Darren, but I can’t find myself liking them much because not a lot of time was spent developing them to the reader.

Harkat is the one character that I can say I consistently liked. We didn’t get much interaction with him, even in the first couple of books he was in. Around the time of Allies of the Night is when his character is involved more in the active plot. Harkat is brave and intelligent and he doesn’t take any crap from Darren. If Darren is wrong Harkat will tell him he is, which rarely happens when main characters are wrong. That little, grey-skinned weirdo is my favorite character, hands down.

Things I Didn't Like

Besides the ending, I didn’t like how boring the books got in certain spots. This is a twelve book long series that would have done better if it was condensed into, possibly, six to eight books. There was a certain boredom that came with reading twelve books in a series where the plot wasn’t all that complex. The plot was simple and there shouldn’t have been so many books, I think.

I didn’t like how female characters were treated. They were either mothers without any lines or fighting women, yes, but they were delegated to the background. Even Evanna, this super strong witch, had no real purpose except to have babies for vampires. She was literally created for the sole purpose of being a vampire/vampaneze incubator. Alice Burgess is about the only female character that I can say I’m happy with. She’s strong and doesn’t get kidnapped (except for the one time with Vancha), as is a common trope in novels that want to pretend they have strong female characters.

The ending was probably my biggest problem with the books. When I first read the Cirque du Freak series years ago I was amazed at the ending because I only focused on how unique it was. It was, and still is unique and amazing. But it’s not very good. It was a letdown. I like the idea of an ending like this, but not the way it was handled.

Diversity

There is a grand total of one person of color in the entirety of the series: Debbie Hemlock. I liked how her dark skin is described as beautiful but that doesn’t make up for the fact that she’s the only confirmed POC. There were very few female characters and none of them were all that central to the plot. There were some hints to depression but it was never named. There was a blind character, which is good, because he also wasn’t shunned or pitied for his blindness. The total diversity in this series wasn’t very good at all. Oh, and I should mention that Shan has said on his Twitter account that there are transgender vampires and there are also same-sex marriages too. They’re not mentioned in the books so they don’t count, but it’s a nice enough thought, I suppose.

Overall

I liked the Cirque du Freak series for the most part. It was a fun ride that gave new ideas to creatures of the night. I won’t say that I liked everything the series had to offer but there’s no denying Darren Shan had an interesting story to tell. I’d recommend that you not read all the books back to back in rapid succession like I did. Mr. Shan’s series isn’t perfect but it’s a creative rethinking of vampires and adventure that’s sure to please a wide range of people. I thank Darren Shan, the author and the protagonist, for taking me on such an amazing adventure and opening up a new world to me.

Here is a link to my notes.

I’ve read this series before, about 10 years ago. And original the ending upset me. But now I think it’s just right.

The idea that our world has more to it then what we know.

Had the last chapter been what I was hoping for or didn't exist at all it would be 5 stars. The entire series amazing, horrifying, everything i wanted to read and then woah here we are. Why oh why did it not stop after the real ending? That last chapter ruined it. Still a good series and highly recommend but don't read all the pages in this book. Just stop.

I have real mixed feelings about this. The ending wasn't bad, but it wasn't what I wanted. I don't know how I wanted this to end. The final fight was great, I loved that. And then I felt it just kinda flat lined. This is probably because this is the last book of the series and the author had to wrap up the whole series. While questions were answered, I feel like the ending was unsatisfactory.
On the series as a whole, I liked it.

It was fun re-reading this series. Brought back so much nostalgia from middle school. The end was okay- not my favorite, but it wrapped things up nicely.

Great young adult fantasy fiction series. 5 stars.
- Straight forward, easy read.
- Thrilling page-turning adventure.
- Interesting characters and worlds.

خب بالاخره این مجموعه هم به پایان رسید. البتّه باید بگویم این دوّمین باری بود که تمامش کردم. بارِ اوّل مربوط می‌شد به دورانِ نوجوانی‌تر (!) که طبیعتاً بیشتر از آن خوشم آمده بود؛ امّا همان موقع هم نظراتِ مشابهی راجع به آن داشتم.

حرف‌هایِ اصلی درموردِ این مجموعه را در مرورِ جلدِ اوّل زده‌ام. آن چیزی که از خوانشِ اوّلِ این مجموعه دربارۀ قسمتِ پایانی به‌صورتِ مبهم در خاطرم مانده بود و می‌خواستم به‌خاطرش به این قسمت سه یا حتّی چهار ستاره بدهم، پایان‌بندیِ آن بود. بعد که دوباره این جلد را خواندم یادم افتاد که در خوانشِ اوّل تا قسمتِ برزخ را بیشتر نخوانده بودم و آنچه بیشتر هیجان‌زده‌ام کرده بود. کلاه گذاشتنِ سرِ دیسموند تینی بود که یک جورهایی کتاب را از کسل‌کننده بودن درآورد.

امّا خب، نصفِ دوّمِ این جلد افتضاح است. پر از شعار است و زورگوییِ داستانی. راجع به روابطِ انسانی، راجع به ادبیّات، راجع به هرآنچه که به‌قولِ نویسنده دیسموند تینی بر آن بوده تا آن‌ها را رقم بزند یا به همشان بریزد. از این جهت به‌شدّت شعارزده بود و خب این شعارزدگی را در آثارِ دیگرش هم می‌توان دید. هرچند در مجموعه‌ای مثلِ «حماسۀ کرپسلی» که بعد از این مجموعه نوشته شده است، با توجّه به تجاربی که احتمالاً نویسنده کسب کرده، غلظتِ آن کمتر و یا جریانِ آن بر بسترِ داستانی بیشتر و بالطبع باورپذیرتر است.
با این حرف‌هایِ قلمبه‌سلمبه نویسنده هم چندان نکوشیده است که آن‌ها را در قالبِ داستان بریزد. نه شیوۀ روایتِ غیرخطّی را بلد است و نه بازی با زمان را. و نه این‌که چه‌قدر این خطّ داستانی ممکن است برایش حاویِ سوتی‌هایِ تاریخی و گاف‌هایِ برجسته باشد. دارن شان است دیگر، چه کارش کنیم. قول داده است در مجموعه‌هایِ بعدی‌اش بیشتر به این موارد فکر کند.

به گمانم بعد از خواندنِ این مجموعه برایِ من حالاحالاها دیگر نوبت به خواندنِ آثارِ دارن شان نمی‌رسد. هرچند مجموعۀ «نبردِ شیاطین» می‌توانست جزء گزینه‌هایِ آینده باشد. امّا با تجربه‌ای که از خواندنِ «جلّادِ لاغر» داشتم، بعید می‌دانم بخواهم به این زودی‌ها (یا اصلاً در کل) سراغش بروم. کمااین‌که خیلی وقت است از ادبیّاتِ فانتزی هم گریزانم و خیلی اقناعم نمی‌کند.

البتّه خدا را چه دیدید، معلوم نیست دیسموند تینی برایمان چه نقشه‌ای کشیده باشد. اگر فردا پس‌فردا زیرِ حرفم زدم، تقصیرِ من نیست. همه‌اش زیرِ سرِ آن کوتولۀ زردپوشِ سبزچکمه است با آن ساعتِ قلبی‌شکلش :)

Reviewed by Grandma Bev for TeensReadToo.com

With this book, we come to the end of the CIRQUE DU FREAK series by Darren Shan, the one we have been waiting for and dreading. Now the Vampire Prince must face his archenemy, Steve Leopard. It is a complex and difficult problem -- He will be dead if he loses and damned if he wins. One of them will die -- the other will become the Lord of the Shadows and destroy the world. Vampire or Vampaneze; who will win? Can Darren cheat destiny? The action is fast and non-stop The complex plot will keep you guessing until the very last page. The story is full of violence with blood and gore. Some of the characters are human, but most are not, and some are very frightening, but most are loyal, and fierce.

Kids can't seem to get enough of Shan's brand of compelling, scary stories, but they also address some serious issues, and show the importance of friendship and sticking to your moral and ethical standards. It seems to me to be a bit too frightening for kids ten years old and under, but maybe just the thing for older teens that are reluctant readers. It's an ongoing story that you might want to start reading with volume one and work your way through the series, but this one has enough background information that you can enjoy it by itself.

Ermmm... Sinceramente no sé cómo empezar a describir este libro(y la saga en general). A mi no me dejó mi persona pasada una idea de cómo empezar a escribir.
No tengo palabras para describir el amor que le he entregado a estos libros. Y ni se diga a los personajes. Larten, Darren, Vancha, Harkat, Evra... ¡hasta Sam! Son unos personajes tan grandiosos. Todos y cada uno de ellos. Incluso Steve.
No voy a contarles el libro entero, pero sí unos spoilers muy grandes.

1.Bien, ¿quién se iba a imaginar el desenlace de tal historia?, ¿quién se iba a imaginar que Darren, el grandioso y pequeño Darren se iría al Lago de las Almas?
2.¿¡Desmond Tiny es el padre de Darren!?, ¿¡Pero qué diablos-!? Y lo más sorprendente... ¡Está en el título! ¿No les he dicho que Darren Shan es un maestro?
3.Steve es hermano de Darren. Dios. Mío. (Sons of destiny, he ahí de nuevo la genialidad de Darren Shan.
4. Darren se convierte en una personita. Esto es muy importante. Un punto muy importante. Porque al momento al que lo mandan después de haberse convertido... ahí fue donde me convertí en un mar de lágrimas. Ahí es donde en realidad surge todo. Increíble, Darren Shan, me has sorprendido una vez más.
5. Sinceramente los momentos en los que Darren estaba en el Lago de las Almas me partieron el corazón. Saber cuánto sufría, cómo pensaba que el volverse loco era mejor...
6. El final. En mi vida había leído un final de esa categoría. Jamás. Fue simplemente... maravilloso. No hay palabras para describirlo. No las suficientes. Cuando estaba llorando mientras comía, mi hermana me preguntó sobre el final. Seguro pensaba que el protagonista moría(lo cual es cierto). Comencé a decirle... pero me quedé en seco a los segundos. No podía, no sabía cómo explicarle. No pude. Tal vez Darren lo hizo con esa intención, ¿no? Quién sabe.
7. Darren pudo cambiar su destino. Lo hizo. ¡Qué cosa tan maravillosa! Le demostró a ese arrogante de Desmond que, cuando decidas, puedes cambiar el rumbo de tu vida.
8. La línea "All things, all words, all lives. Everything at once and never. n  Mr. Crepsley waiting.n Laughter in the great beyond. I'm going... I'm... going... I'm... gone." Romperá mi corazón por siempre. Pero lleno de amor, felicidad y tristeza.

----------------
Yo... no sé qué más agregar. Un aplauso para esos personajes que se nos fueron en el transcurso de la historia. Larten, Sam, Gavner, etc.
No cambiaría la saga por el mundo entero. De verdad. Me ha encantado, la he amado. Y lo seguiré haciendo.
Darren Shan es un escritor increíble. Y creo que quien haya leído la saga está de acuerdo conmigo.

Por ti, Darren Shan, dondequiera que estés en este momento.

2018 edit:
Heads up: the "review" you see below was written by a very immature high school girl more than 10 years ago so don't take it too seriously - this is still one of my most favorite series of all time, one that I've re-read multiple times in its entirety, and I've long since reconciled myself with the ending and actually think it's alright and works for this story. I'd give it 4/5 stars now, but I'm just gonna leave my old rating and review for, I don't know, the sake of posterity and nostalgia, since those were my raw initial thoughts after first reading it as an eighth grader.


2008-ish:
Why oh why did the author have to screw up everything and give us this piece of shit after eleven perfectly good, well-played novels? What kinduva crappy ending is this?? We have no idea what the final say on the vampires and vampaneze are, what happened to Darren's friends, or who Darren really is!! What's with this randomness about Mr.Tiny being Darren's father?!?!?! It's like in one of those movies that's trying to be funny by making one of the characters say 'Luke, I am your father.' And he set everything up!! Who wants a story where everything happened because it was set up!?!

What a conclusion! I have no words. The full circle...I am just...speechless. I need further answers.
This is a series that stick in my mind for a LONG time to come.

never before have i come across a writer how kinda undoes his whole series with the last book.