The previous two books contained quite a bit of foreshadowing for stuff that shows up in this book, and boy does it pay off. Pretty much every outstanding plot thread gets tied off, and unlike some series I could mention (coughMaximumRidecough), all the reveals are internally consistent. It's almost like this whole thing was planned from the beginning.
For a book |with "treasure" in the title|, The Adventurer's Guide to Treasure (Etc.) is |oddly MacGuffin-less|.
The BBEG (Big Bad Evil Guy) is named Octo-Horse Pirate. As his business cards proclaim, he is half octopus, half horse, and all pirate. He is also much more than a simple piratical octopus horse, in ways that I can't detail without both spoiling things and taking like eight paragraphs to provide the necessary background.
Speaking of necessary background, did someone say "complicated plot structure"? Because I certainly didn't, but this book does have one. It's the kind of plot that tends to take me multiple paragraphs to describe even in the most condensed format, and it's also full of dramatic reveals that I don't want to spoil, so I'm not going to try summarizing it. But suffice it to say that if I hadn't already read the book, I would not have expected most of these plot twists.
I think that this book ended things well. As I said before, it ties off all the plot threads, but it doesn't do so in an overly convenient way. And it has one of the best types of ending, the pseudo-open kind where this isn't the end of everything but it is the end of the story.
If it weren't for irritating things like "meals", I'd have reread each of these three books in one sitting apiece.
Oh, by the way. The titular Adventurer's Guide is a magickally self-editing guidebook that gives useful advice on whatever situation you find yourself in. Usually. The protagonists' copy is a bit wonky after having been accidentally stabbed in the first book.
Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for fantasy violence. And I think that this series would make a fantastic videogame.
4 stars.
Favorite lines:
Walk the halls of castle high,
Wake the rose that never bloomed,
Hand it to the legend's power,
Free the worlds betrayal doomed.
Page 69. The third quest riddle.
"I heard that once, while in a terrible rage, he pulled the arms off an entire coop of chickens," said the clerk.
"Um, chickens don't have arms," said Hiro.
"Not after he finished with them, they didn't. That's for certain."
Page 129-130. Discussing Octo-Horse Pirate.
"Don't worry," said Honest Ehd. "It'll fly, or my name isn't Honest Ehd."
"Is that your real name?" asked Hiro.
"No, it's actually Morally Ambiguous Patrick. But the ship will still fly, guaranteed."
Page 242.
Anne stared through the open doorway, a look of incomprehension on her face. "Hiro, what spell did you cast?"
"I thought it said Chain Lightning," said Hiro.
Penelope yanked the catalog out of his hand and examined it. "Two of the pages are taped together, you ninny. You read the first part of Chain Lightning and the second part of Summon Chicken Swarm." She handed the catalog back to him. "Congratulations, O Master of Magic, you just invented chicken lightning."
Page 297-298.
(Endnote: According to The Adventurer's Guide to Writing Endnotes, I should put something silly here.)
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