Book Review :: Any Way the Wind Blows by Rainbow Rowell

Any Way the Wind Blows by Rainbow Rowell
ISBN: 1529039924
Series: Simon Snow #3
Published by Pan Macmillan
Genres: Magic, Young Adult
Pages: 579
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In Carry On, Simon Snow and his friends realized that everything they thought they understood about the world might be wrong. And in Wayward Son, they wondered whether everything they understood about themselves might be wrong.

In Any Way the Wind Blows, Simon and Baz and Penelope and Agatha have to decide how to move forward.
For Simon, that means deciding whether he still wants to be part of the World of Mages -- and if he doesn't, what does that mean for his relationship with Baz? Meanwhile, Baz is bouncing between two family crises and not finding any time to talk to anyone about his newfound vampire knowledge. Penelope would love to help, but she's smuggled a cursed American Normal into London, and now she isn't sure what to do with him. And Agatha? Well, Agatha Wellbelove has had enough.

Any Way the Wind Blows takes the gang back to England, back to Watford, and back to their families for their longest and most emotionally wrenching adventure yet.

This book is a finale. It tells secrets and answers questions and lays ghosts to rest.

Carry On was conceived as a book about Chosen One stories; Any Way the Wind Blows is an ending about endings. About catharsis and closure, and how we choose to move on from the traumas and triumphs that try to define us.

Last updated on 13 February 2023

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The story of Any Way the Wind Blows

This entire series (Simon Snow) came out of Rainbow Rowell’s book, Fangirl. And I love that it did. In Fangirl, one of the main characters writes fanfiction about Simon and Baz, two characters in a well-known fandom in their world … and then Rainbow Rowell bought that fanfiction to life. Any Way the Wind Blows follows directly on from the events in Wayward Son, and while it’s bitter-sweet because it’s the final book in the trilogy, it wasn’t even going to BE a trilogy so we’re lucky to have it. Or are we?

“What a ridiculous creature. Happy that I put butter on his sandwich. As if I wouldn’t make the world spin backwards if I thought he’d like it better that way.”

Any Way the Wind Blows follows our main characters – Simon, Baz, Penelope and Agatha – as they wrestle with the events in America (in Wayward Son) and deal with their own mayhem. Simon is wrestling internally, Baz is wrestling with his family, Penelope is wrestling with the fact that she has a cursed American Normal to deal with, and Agatha is wrestling with the Watford goats. Quite literally.

Alongside all of that and the general chaos that these characters bring upon themselves and the world around them, there’s a so-called Chosen One restoring magic and bringing hope to the people. But is what he says true? Is he the Chosen One? Wasn’t Simon the Chosen One?

My thoughts on Any Way the Wind Blows

There’s always this tension with the Simon Snow books. When I first launched into Carry On,  the first in the series (when we thought it was a stand-alone novel!), I loved it to bits. But there was also this weird sense that it sat a little oddly with me. Many people don’t love Carry On because it feels like you’ve been thrust into a story right in the middle, with very little back story to go on. And that’s true, and that sort of what-is-going-on feeling runs throughout the book.

“I need to replace every single person in my life with someone more functional, is what I need.”

But after my second read of Carry On I really did love it. That love has gone slowly downhill after the rest of the series came out, but overall, I have really enjoyed it. Yes, sometimes it’s crazy-beyond-belief, sometimes it’s jarring because you’ve been thrown into a world you don’t know a lot about, and yes sometimes you wish you could shake the characters out of their ridiculousness, but overall, it’s a fun series.

Having said that, I really didn’t like Simon in this book. The whole Simon-Baz relationship got very needy but also very infuriating at the same time, and that’s one of the reasons it went down an entire star for me. While I loved that tension in the first book, I could have done with less annoyance in this final one. My favourite storyline was definitely Penelope and Shepard, and watching them try and figure out how to rid Shepard of his curse.

The other aspect of the book that dropped it down a star was the disjointedness of the book. Everyone is sort of doing their thing, and we miss out on that friendship group doing what they do best: working together. Some of the best parts of the previous two books are when they’re all together as a MAGICAL SQUAD taking on whatever it is they need to take on that day. I missed that in Any Way the Wind Blows. I get that it’s a book about endings and that it’s about character development and them working on their issues and great great great, but it did feel like everything could have happened a lot faster and a lot less randomly if they were all together in the first place. Deep breath.

Overall thoughts

So what now? I loved Carry On, and I enjoyed their adventures in America in Wayward Son, and while Any Way the Wind Blows was still a 3-star read for me, I didn’t love it like I did Carry On (so much so I’ve read it twice and I would definitely read it again).

If you have read Carry On and Wayward Son then you do really have to read this. And overall, I promise you did I enjoy it. But it didn’t quite live up to my expectations. And that makes me sad.

Have you read Any Way the Wind Blows? Without spoiling it for others, what did you think?