Gray Dawn

Black Hat Bureau, Book 10

By: Hailey Edwards

Narrated by: Stephanie Richardson

Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

In this tenth and final installment of the Black Hat Bureau series, Rue races the clock to find her little moth girl before it's too late. As much as she wants to believe that Clay will protect Colby, he isn't himself when he's under the director's thrall. And the director would toss a loinnir back like a shot of pure magic if he got his hands on her.

As if Rue doesn't already have enough heaped on her plate, Luca is spreading her poison west in a twisted game of take-out roulette. Now Rue must decide if saving one life is worth sacrificing the dozens of innocents Luca will kill if Rue doesn't make stopping her the top priority.

As the director, Rue ought to put her agents' lives and the Bureau's purpose above her own, but Colby is her child and—right or wrong—Rue would burn down the world to save her.

Contains mature themes.

©2024 Black Dog Books, LLC (P)2024 Tantor

Everything I wanted in a final book

First of all, when I started to write this, I was shocked to realize that this was the tenth book in this series. I guess I don't always excel at paying attention to the details (and fortunately or unfortunately.... I read A LOT of books). What I DO want to say is that for me, this series started of extremely strong, then had a bit of a lag during the middle books. Then, the last...say 3 or 4 books...I could feel that strength coming back. This last and final book - well, it was a perfect and wonderful ending that brought the level of my reading enjoyment back up to where it belonged. So...bravo! <i>*giving a very deserved chef's kiss*</i>

There are a lot of moving parts, especially when you get to the 10th book in a series and there a lot of ties to be tied up. In this case in particular, there were several "bad guys" that our group had been dealing with and one "good guy" who was in a kind of hostage/ransom situation. What all that means is a lot had to happen, to solve all of the issues, tie up all of the loose ends, answer our worries about a certain captive.....yep, lots had to happen.

Without going into spoilers, I think the easiest way to say what I want to say is that the things that made this series wonderful in the beginning, were what made it fantastic in the end. There was a crazy amount of world building set up early in the series that was easy to follow. There were wonderful, likeable character's (and some really UNLIKEABLE characters) that truly brought this series to the top of a very crowded genre. The whole "found family" aspect of it was done so nicely, that you couldn't help but root for the good guys.

The narration. There are a few times when I will say in a review that this is a book that is actually made better by listening versus reading. This is one of those. The narrator -Stephanie Richardson - made some fantastic choices early on that completely made the story that much more enjoyable. The portrayal of our favorite "moth girl" Colby (<i>*another chef's kiss*</i>, and the best of the best.....BLAY!!!! Oh my gosh, I don't even know HOW I would have heard/pictured his voice in my head on my own, but because of Ms. Richardson...Blay was Blay......and he was freaking adorable.

So, really not that much more to say. This isn't a stand alone. If you are with us for the 10th book in a series, then there is obviously something about the series that has hooked you. This book has MANY things that fill that requirement. And maybe, just maybe, even though this saga is completed, we might one day get back into this world to follow along with some of the other wonderful characters that we met along the way. (we can only hope....)