Perfect end to a perfect trilogy

I found this to be a truly dynamic ending to the Winner's Curse series. Excellent plotting and characters, and surprisingly visceral with its portrayal of battle. This made me want to read more Rutkoski. Highly recommended!

A great conclusion and the best book of the trilogy by far. The action is nonstop and the relationships become more complex and poignant. I loved every second of this.

MUCH better than the second book. Really satisfying ending to the series.

Great conclusion to the series.

This final book in the Winner’s Trilogy is as perfect an ending to the story as it could be. The writing continues to be impressive and tells a complex emotional story of loss and hope, betrayal and friendship, love and war, in a way that is both lyrical and gritty.

The relationships between all the various characters, not just Arin and Kestrel, form an integral part of the story, which is ultimately about finding peace and forgiveness in yourself and others. While there is no shortage of blood and battle in this book, this is tempered by the characters' constant struggle to balance the human and personal costs of the war in which they are engaged, so that victory, should they ultimately achieve it, will still be worth having.

Overall, I would rate the series as a whole at 4.5 stars. Start to finish it only gets better from the first book on and is well worth reading.

I am firmly in the minority here, obviously, but I was disappointed by this ending.

Rutkoski should have named this book, "Hey Y'all, My Name is Marie and I've Written a Book Made of Pure Perfection". That wouldn't have fit on the cover very nicely, so I guess "The Winner's Kiss" will do.

Not sure I'll read a better book this year. Heartbreaking. Joyous. Touching in the most surprising of ways. Certainly not to be missed.

I didn't want to read this bc I knew I was going to cry and here I am crying

THINGS I LOVED ABOUT THIS BOOK:
- The raw love between the characters
- To have such a powerful and strong heroine
- To have an equally strong and sensitive main male character
- The poetic writing
- How easy and addicting it was to read *coughlistencough*
- The scheming
- Roshar
- The constance of music and the beautiful ending

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:
- How war and strategies were explained and narrated
- Its two-people-centered storyline
- The narrator’s voice for male characters
- The easiness of it all (Arin saving her, the war, capturing her father)
- The lack of consequences of war