I missed the wonder of Trollus, and the political atmosphere and the players that I was finally getting used to from the first book. When the author brought in all these other characters from Trianon as political pieces, I winced. Any time you bring in a million different people, all with their own motivations, it becomes a slippery slope. And when your main characters spend most of their time trying to unravel the complicated mess of lies that accompanies political maneuvering, it can get boring. Thankfully, there was enough action to keep me reading, but this sequel lost something I can't quite put my finger on.

I felt as if the author was trying to mimic Game of Thrones, with enemies at all sides, our hero and heroine having to puzzle out who was on their side vs who was a tiny bit on their side, and Cecile was trying to learn more about her magic, but it all got lost in the search for Anushka, and I saw that 'twist' from a mile away. The more I think about it, more than a few of the plot points and directions the characters took make even less sense.

I'm going to stop now, before I remember more things I didn't like. :(

Just as good as the first one! So excited to read the third and figure out how the story continues!

The story improved from book 1 to book 2. I am anxious to read the final book.

Nice follow-up. Kinda lacking but still great imo.

This book was really good but just not as good as the first book. I do enjoy where the story seems to be going and I’m excited to see how it ends.

Plot twist bitch

In the first book I complained about having too much action, but compared to this book the first book was just enough. Still a great continuation in the story, but was soo predictable.

I can't wait for the last book!

“Sometimes, one must do the unthinkable," I said, "for it is the only way to accomplish the impossible.”

5 beautiful stars to the sequel in a new favorite series of mine! What a tremendous joy it is to read this series. #2 in the series did not disappoint!

In the beginning, it wasn’t as fast paced at times as the first book was, but that’s okay. Looking back on the entire reading experience of this book, it shows a really great build-up because the author took her time to elaborate on everything, which just takes time if you want to do it nicely. And even though this book is quite thick (thicker than your average YA book) it never feels like a thick book, you know? It was so fast-paced, even though there was so much more depth being added to it all. There’s always a lot happening and it had me entertained from beginning till end. Every time I was reading, I was like ‘just one more chapter’ and before I knew it, I was done already.

The story picks up a couple of months where book 1 ends, and it expands so immensely, in the best way possible. More politics, more storyline development, more world building and more character development. I couldn’t be happier with how much more depth was added to all these elements.

The build-up towards the end and the plot coming to fruitition is really nicely done in my opinion. Things get so frigging intense towards the end, that I couldn’t flip the pages fast enough. My suspicions regarding the plot were correct, although the author had me doubting throughout the entire book haha. The execution of it all was really well written down. When I finished, I couldn’t run to my bookcase fast enough to grab book 3, lol.

I really liked reading about both Trollus and the world outside of Trollus this time around, whereas book 1 took mostly place in Trollus (which was good seeing we got to explore the new to us world in book 1 that way). Seeing a lot of the characters now being present in the outside world, it gave us the opportunity to read more about minor characters that we hadn’t read that much of in book 1, so that was definitely a plus. I really liked seeing old friendships being rekindled but I also really liked seeing new ones develop.

I immensely enjoyed reading about these characters. They are all quite diverse, really interesting and complement each other really well.

Now, my expectations are set very high regarding book 3 seeing how much I’ve loved the prequel book, book 1 and now book 2. I really cannot wait to see how the author wraps it all up. Seeing how much growth the series had during book 2, I’m so excited about book 3. The ending of book 2 leaves you on the edge, beyond excited to pick up book 3 right away.

Conclusion
So yeah… I couldn’t be happier about how this book turned out to be. I love the expansion of basically every element; characters, world, plot, and more. It was captivating and enthralling right from the start. Danielle’s writing is so beautiful and I have a feeling she isn’t capable of letting me down. I’ve read 4 books by her so far and each and every one of them was just a really great reading experience. New favorite author!!! If you didn’t pick up on what I’m saying here: GO PICK UP THIS SERIES! This is definitely a hidden gem within the YA book community and I can’t recommend it enough.

This is a fun series! Definitely engaging.