by Julie T. (link)
Genre het, romance, drama
Pairings Isaac/OFC, Taylor/OFC, Zac/OFC
Length 36 chapters and epilogue
Status Completed (third in the Ten Years Trilogy)
Much like the beginning of the second story in this trilogy, Shimmering begins several years in the future with a quick recap, from multiple perspectives, about what we’ve missed in the interim. I am still not a fan of this quirk of Julie’s writing, nor do I expect much good from her backstory for the girl Taylor did actually end up with after a few hints dropped at the end of The Dance.
The three romances are a big part of the plot, and they don’t get much more mature here even though all three brothers are engaged or married. In fact, the focus on marriage as the end goal and “waiting until marriage” as massively important just make me roll my eyes. It’s a contrived sort of drama for so much of Zac’s plot to be about how hard it is for him not to sleep with Lacey before their wedding, and it adds nothing at all to the plot.
Although the plot revolves largely around the bigotry of Taylor’s fiancee Bonnie’s parents, it doesn’t get too cheesy. It does, however, take a rather sinister turn that never goes quite where I expect it to go. This ends up being my favorite part of the plot, and I don’t even mind that the story ends up a fairly vague note for Taylor. It’s in keeping with how the other stories ended and doesn’t actually leave me wanting more from this trilogy.
Review by Bethany (website)