Brighid's Quest (Partholon, #5) By: P.C. Cast (Book Review)

 (There will be spoilers included in this review)

Summary:

Rather than follow her family's restrictive rules, centaur Brighid chose to set out on her own to make friends and form relationships with humans as well as centaurs. Now she's facing her toughest challenge yet. While helping guide home a grieving human; Cuchulainn, her friend Elphame's brother. Brighid finds herself beginning to care for him. An emotion forbidden by her clan. 

To add to her troubles, the Great Goddess has awoken the power of the Shaman within Brighid, the first centaur so blessed in ages. And just as she's torn between taking up a power she never expected and a love she's afraid to admit to, Brighid receives a vision of a tragedy that might destroy everyone she's ever cared about...

Brighid's Quest is the best book in the series! Many of the books in this series had no plot-line and lack of progression in the story. But not with this one! From start to finish there was action, character development and the story just kept unfolding till the very last page. From Brighid fulfilling her destiny, the New Fomorians finally making it to Partholon and saving Cuchulainn. Thus far, this has been the best book I've read from P.C Cast and it makes me angry that she waited till the last book in the series to give us this quality. I'm that type of reader that feels compelled in finishing a series while many others aren't. As soon as they get to a bad book in a series they move onto the next one. I'm happy that I held on and read this book. 

It's exciting to finally read from the point of view of a centaur. All the previous books have been from the point of view of humans gifted by Epona. I was always curious about a centaurs point of view and no one better to get that from than Brighid. From the get go Brighid was on her quest, granted, I'm pretty sure she didn't think it would go past bringing Cuchulainn and the New Fomorians to MacCallan castle. 

Brighid finds Cuchulainn and the New Fomorians in the wastelands and when she finds him, she discovers that he has a fragmented soul from Brenna's passing since he blames himself for ignoring the Otherworld's warning of Brenna's death. Through bringing the missing piece of his soul back from the Otherworld so he can be whole again, Brighid comes to the realization that she cares and even loves him. And through that journey to piece his soul together she is finally accepting the Shaman within her. 

Most would think that marrying the man who was in love with her dead friend would be weird and trust me when Brighid and Cuchulainn started getting close I was thinking how weird it was and wrong on so many levels but Brighid didn't even realize that they cared about each other till she retrieved the missing part of his soul. I love that we were able to see the character development for both of them and the progression in their relationship. Seeing all that, it makes sense as to why these two fell in love. 

Despite being a beautiful Huntress, Brighid has insecurities and was always thinking about Brenna first. That is what a good soul and a kind friend would do. I did find it odd how quickly Cuchulainn was able to move on from Brenna because two months isn't very much time to heal and move on. Especially, if she was the 'love' of his life. He ended up getting two in the spam of three months. Pretty absurd timing.

Brighid and Cuchulainn ended up needing each other. He needed her so he can finally become whole  and to find love, again. And she needed him to help her fulfill her destiny in becoming High Shaman of the Dhianna herd. One scene that resonated with me a lot was when the Centaur Plains were burned down and the New Fomorians were able to nurture it back to life. Only through fire and burning down the old we may move forward and nurture new life. 

Rating:

I am going to give this book 5 stars on 5. I absolutely loved it and couldn't stop reading it. It was packed with action, the story had development and it was running smoothly while being captivating. Best book thus far. I'm think it might not be the final book in the series because towards the end, Fallon became free and found the remaining Fomorians who never perished from the war over a hundred years ago. If Cast can continue the series with the same quality of work I'll be the first to buy it.