Enjoyed this surprisingly more than I expected 😅 I still don’t like the Alina-Mal romance, Nikolai said it right “for an eternal love, you’re both really insecure about it” 🫠 FUCKING TALK TO EACH OTHER?!!

I love Nikolai!! He was entertaining and had some great one liners. The pacing is so much better compared to book 1,

also maybe helps that book 2 is very different from the adaptation so I wasn’t as bored because I didn’t know everything that would happen and when.

I also liked Tolya and Tamar, they had more personality and we got to know them better compared to side characters in the first book. I was pleasantly surprised that I liked this more than Shadow and Bone (mostly because of Nikolai and the pacing was better)! I’m actually excited to read book 3 now