I finished The Desolations of Devil's Acre on a Saturday morning when I had set aside the whole day for it, having cleared my schedule specifically because I knew this was the last book in Ransom Riggs's Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children series and I was not going to rush it. Fifteen hours with Kirby Heyborne, the hollow-haunted peculiarium of Devil's Acre, and an apocalyptic villain who had been building to this moment across six books. It felt like an event.
For those coming in fresh, which, to be clear, is not recommended, the series follows Jacob Portman, a teenager from Florida who discovers he is peculiar: someone with the rare ability to see and destroy hollowgast, monstrous creatures that hunt people with supernatural abilities. The preceding five books have taken Jacob through Victorian-era time loops, the Library of Souls, a second trilogy expanding the mythology, and a near-constant state of barely-survived catastrophe. This finale picks up exactly where the previous book left, with Jacob and his ally Noor transported back to his grandfather's house, with the series' primary antagonist Caul having risen from the Library of Souls with an army of new horrors called desolations.
First, the Big Picture
Riggs makes a smart structural choice by anchoring the finale in Devil's Acre, the peculiar underworld settlement that has served as a hub across the second trilogy. The decision gives the book a sense of returning home to confront something rather than the constant flight that characterized earlier installments. The desolations, weather fronts of ash and blood and bone that signal Caul's approaching army, are an effective bit of mythological escalation. They feel earned rather than invented for convenience.
The prophecy element, which involves Noor being one of seven prophesied peculiars whose gathering might stop Caul, is the book's central tension. One reviewer noted that going into a YA series finale, you expect most characters to survive, and that this foreknowledge can drain some suspense. Riggs threads this needle reasonably well. The emotional stakes do not depend entirely on mortality, the question of what the survivors will lose, and what they will become, carries its own weight separate from who lives through the last act.
Why Listen to The Desolations of Devil's Acre
Kirby Heyborne has been with this series long enough to have absorbed its rhythms completely. His Jacob is recognizable across six books of growth, still the slightly bewildered kid from Florida, but now weighted with genuine grief and responsibility. The way Heyborne modulates between the tentative Jacob of the early series and this harder, more purposeful version is the kind of character continuity that makes long-series listening so satisfying. He also handles the ensemble cast with care, giving each peculiar a distinct enough vocal register that the large-group scenes remain navigable.
At fifteen hours, this is the longest entry in the series, and it earns the running time. Riggs does not pad, the book moves through several distinct acts, each with its own emotional register, and the pacing rarely stalls. The sequence where Jacob and company race through history's most dangerous loops to find the prophesied gathering place is the kind of inventive escalation the series has always done well.
A Few Reservations
The vintage photograph element, which has been a defining feature of the print series, is carried into the audio experience through the companion PDF. Listeners should download it before starting, the photographs Riggs curates are not decorative. They are integral to the atmosphere he has built, and listening while having access to them occasionally enriches scenes that directly reference specific images.
One detail worth knowing: the book addresses the second trilogy's expanded cast without losing the original peculiars who have been central since book one. Managing a cast this large in a finale is genuinely difficult, and some secondary characters get slightly compressed treatment in the final act. Readers with strong attachments to specific supporting peculiars may find their closure thinner than hoped.
Who Should Pick Up The Desolations of Devil's Acre
This is emphatically a book for readers who have completed at least the first trilogy and ideally all five preceding books. The emotional payoff, and there is real emotional payoff, depends entirely on accumulated investment. For those listeners, it is among the more satisfying YA series conclusions in recent years. Multiple reviewers described feeling the specific melancholy of a beloved series ending, which is the right kind of reaction: the sadness of leaving, not the frustration of disappointment. Start from book one if you have not yet. The series genuinely rewards the commitment.
- Voice: Kirby Heyborne has been the voice of this series from the start, and his work in this finale is confident and emotionally assured, he knows these characters as well as any narrator could.
- Big ideas: sacrifice and prophecy, found family under apocalyptic pressure, the cost of being chosen
- Atmosphere: Propulsive and high-stakes, with a genuine sense of accumulated consequence from five previous books
- Worth it?: A finale that actually delivers, rare enough to be worth saying plainly. If you have read the series, this is the ending it deserved.
Can The Desolations of Devil's Acre be listened to as a standalone audiobook?
No. This is the sixth book in the Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children series and assumes familiarity with all preceding books. The plot picks up immediately after the events of book five with no recap. Starting here without the prior books would make the story nearly incomprehensible.
Does the companion PDF with vintage photographs need to be downloaded separately?
Yes. The photographs, which are a defining feature of the series, are included in a companion PDF that is available in your Audible library alongside the audio. Downloading it before you start listening is recommended, as some scenes reference specific images directly.
How does Kirby Heyborne perform the large ensemble cast in the finale?
Heyborne gives each major peculiar a distinct enough vocal quality that the ensemble scenes remain navigable. His portrayal of Jacob's evolution across the series is the strongest element of his performance, the character reads as genuinely changed by six books of experience.
Is the ending of the series satisfying, or does it leave threads unresolved?
Multiple reviewers describe the ending as genuinely satisfying, with one calling it one of the most satisfying series conclusions they had read in some time. Some secondary characters receive thinner closure than readers might hope, but the core arc of Jacob, Noor, and Miss Peregrine resolves fully.
