Week 48 Review: Gabriel's Redemption

From Goodreads:
Professor Gabriel Emerson has left his position at the University of Toronto to embark on a new life with his beloved Julianne. Together, he's confident that they can face any challenge. And he's eager to become a father.

But Julianne's graduate program threatens Gabriel's plans, as the pressures of being a student become all consuming. When she is given the honor of presenting an academic lecture at Oxford, Gabriel is forced to confront her about the subject of her presentation – research that conflicts with his own. And in Oxford, several individuals from their past appear, including an old nemesis intent on humiliating Julia and exposing one of Gabriel's darkest secrets.

In an effort to confront his remaining demons, Gabriel begins a quest to discover more about his biological parents, beginning a chain of events that has startling repercussions for himself, Julianne, and his hope of having a family.

My Review:
Really enjoyed reading this book! It has been a while since I read the first two, so most of what happened in them is a bit of a blank, which sucks, but oh, well! I enjoyed this one a lot, it was a great ending to the series, lots of happy endings!

Most of the book's conflict is about family. Specifically, their birth parents, and those that their lives touched, and their own family, and the possibility of a baby, that was realised in the end, and yeah, really enjoyed how that was handled!

Ah, the parentheticals, the remarks in them, they were hilarious, and true statements from outside the story, about what was going on, side notes of a sort, and yeah, they were just so funny! Loved those a lot!

The scene where Gabriel donates the illustrations to the Uffizi Gallery, there was a guy that looked familiar to Julia, and seemed pretty menacing. And I was hoping that we were going to get a bit more then that. And we are, because The Prince, a prequel novella to the new series, The Florentine, deals a bit with that! So yeah, spin off series!

Lots of great endings, with Christa having to go to a different college because of her work ethic, the one professor being stuck in Italy, Nicole broken up with Simon and in California, Simon broken up with his fiancée, Rachel and Aaron taking a break from trying for a baby, and Tom and Diane, and baby Tommy! And Richard living in his old house, and yeah, that was really great!

Favourite lines: "I've known Jeremy and his wife for years. Believe me, Christa Peterson couldn't catch his eye if she were naked, holding the original manuscript of The Decameron and a case of beer." You'd think the manuscript would catch his eye, but good for him! "Planning on invading Baghdad? Or just Charlestown?" Yeah, a Hummer isn't exactly a good idea! "I'm sorry I missed that. Picton and Christa in a steel-cage death match? We could have sold popcorn." Yeah, you could've! "A shotgun wedding for Tom, who is probably the only person I know who actually owns a shotgun. I'd label the situation as ironic, except I now better." That takes the fun out of it! "That's probably a good thing, or God would have sent him twins." And seeing as she's grown, having twin baby siblings would be even more weird! "It was possible the professor would have accepted death as an excuse as to why his teaching assistant missed class. Although it was doubtful." Sounds like a hard ass! "He thought his Prada frames were a good deal smarter than the horrific pair that Clark Kent wore." Too bad, a child thinks not! And thinks you're Superman! "I do, but at what cost? I never thought I'd say this, but we're having too much sex. I'm beginning to feel like a machine." And that must suck! "I reminded him the longer he took to heal, the longer he'd have to wait for sex. He grabbed the pill bottle out of my hand. I don't think we'll have trouble getting him to take his medication anymore." Nope, three weeks are long enough for him, he doesn't want to make that wait longer! "One might observe that being grumpy and cross was precisely his old self." Well, his really old self, not his newest old self! "We're having ripped-up-note sex. I've been waiting for this forever." There's a lot of various titles to the reasons why and where they're having sex. It's pretty funny! "Wait till the cousins learn that there's now a Catholic wing of Reform Judaism." Yeah, because it's an another wing besides the Presbyterian wing! "I went to Princeton, Oxford, and Harvard. I can certainly learn how to look after a baby." 2 different skill sets there, though! "You'll be up to your elbows in dirty diapers and burping cloths, surviving on a few hours' sleep, and trying to soothe a cranky, colicy tyrant by reading Goodnight Moon over and over. In English. Because I don't think Dante successfully completed hi Italian translation of it." Well, Gabriel can always translate it! "Maybe he didn't say anything. Maybe he just stood there." Yes, because what works on a demon and a condemned soul works on God! "Where did you go, and anti-oral sex college?" It's for the health of Julia and the baby, Gabriel! No need to get that testy! "I was just telling Julianne that I accept the distinguished appointment as your baby's godmother." Well, technically they didn't ask, but yeah. This also makes me wonder about if I have a godparent? "Bit like Mars, really. Except with more sex." Yeah, seeing as there's no humans on Mars, there'd be more sex with Academia then on Mars! "Your father is proud of us for having a baby. That means he's proud of us for having sex and you for impregnating me. Do you think they make T-shirts for grandfathers that express those sentiments?" And that's the weird thing about sex for me-that babies let people know that you have been doing so. I mean, they know, but now they have concrete proof. It's just weird, and if it's your parents, then it's gross! "He had no idea that Jack Mitchell was sitting in his dark Oldsmobile outside the police station, thinking of his pregnant niece, and smiling." I feel bad for Simon's ex-fiancée, she doesn't deserve this, but Simon does! "He was distressed to learn that the Pottery Barn Kids gift registry did not extend to children's books in Italian or Yiddish." Maybe the Italy version of the store has a selection of books? I don't know what area Yiddish comes from, though. "At least if there's a power outage we'll be able to find you. You'll just have to drop your pants." Yeah, weird to have neon on your boxers! "But that didn't stop him from Googling transverse positions and their attendant information on his iPhone. (It should be noted that at that point, Julia wished he'd left the damn thing at home.)" Yeah, better to not know, when it might be something you're going through soon, leave it to the pros! "We should probably talk about what we're going to call her. Her grandfathers are not going to be impressed with the name Spring Roll." Nope, and neither would she!

Yeah, this was a fantastic book, and I can't wait to read more!

Author: Sylvain Reynard
Series: Gabriel's Inferno #3
Read: November 23rd, 2014
Source: Tuebl
Reason Why: Love this series, and it's a LLFL Book, Prequel & Sequel Challenge 2014 Book and a End of Series 2014 Book!
Publisher: Berkley
Published: December 3rd 2013

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars