Here we are, back again in the Grishaverse where our Grisha favorites and their demon King are on the verge of all out war. “Rule of Wolves” picks up pretty much right where we left off in “King of Scars”, but Bardugo really understands that there are readers (like me) who take obscenely long to finish a series so she sprinkles subtle reminders of the big events throughout the first 30% of the book, so even though it’s been a while, very quickly I was immersed in the world again and head down in the story. Seriously, for this book being so intimidatingly long, it was a smooth and easy read; Bardugo is master of knowing when to switch POV’s so that I constantly want to keep reading to progress each individual character’s story lines! Plus, the way she handles the conflict between Ravka and Frejda and the horrors of escalating war with bigger and bigger weapons was perfectly done, and that’s on top of the smooth way the author is able to include a diverse cast and the prejudices those characters deal with. I was thoroughly impressed with both the story and the characters in this second book to say the least! In fact, there were only a few things that bothered me, which were made all the more frustrating because they were things I used to love in this universe.

I loved the first book in the Skysail Saga, “The Apotheosis Break”. But I read the first book in 2017, not terribly long after it first came out, and the sequel, “The Gestalt Job” was published at the end of 2019. So, to say there has been a lapse where I had a hard time remembering important details would be an understatement.  Which wasn’t helped by the fact that this book starts with our main character, Vasili, having forgotten big chunks of what occurred in the previous adventure as well. It’s part of the mystery woven throughout the whole story, so it is by design, but even so. Vasili remembers bits and pieces of his past adventure, the theft of the shard at a nobles party, the betrayal, a lost friend, and his own harrowing escape, but what he doesn’t remember is how he got from that escape to being back on the airship with the same crew who might have been the cause of that betrayal. The same crew who still don’t seem to want to, or are able to, tell Vasili about the one thing he craves above all else: stories of the father he never knew. A lot of the themes in this book are the same as its predecessor: innocent, naïve little Vasili fumbling in a world he doesn’t understand but is determined to be Vasili the Brave all the same. So, what I wanted were the answers Vasili has been on a quest for over the course of this series. Instead, the mystery only got deeper.

“Whisper of the Lotus” is a little deceiving, but not in a bad way! The synopsis focuses heavily on this idea of the main character, Charlotte, needing excitement, fleeing a dead-end job to impulsively visit her childhood best friend (Roxy) who has been living and thriving in Cambodia for the past 3 years after leaving London. In reality, the book is much deeper than that. Charlotte is less fleeing a boring existence, as she is getting away from a narcissistic parent who has emotionally taken advantage of her and guilt tripped her into never leaving. We watch Charlotte do things for herself for the first time in nearly a decade and through the experience of traveling so far away and meeting so many kind people, discover a voice that her mother almost completely took away. I don’t know if this book necessarily needed to take place in Cambodia in order for it to have the same emotional impact as we learn more and more of the secrets hidden from Charlotte, but here we are.

I have to say, I probably made a mistake with trying to read the “Throne of Glass” series before starting this series by Sarah J. Maas, as I am finding this book to be vastly better despite all the spoilers I’ve already encountered. The spoilers are my fault; this series is insanely popular and I wanted until NOW to start it. So with all the beautiful fan art of the characters floating around, let’s just say I knew certain elements very intimately of this series long before I cracked the spine on “A Court of Thorns and Roses”. But you know what? I think those spoilers actually helped me enjoy this book more. No, really! This first book is supposed to be a Beauty and the Beast retelling, but I found it to be much closer to East of the Sun, West of the Moon. So, if you are like me and haven’t started this book yet, hopefully that gives you a pretty good idea of what you’re getting into. The world is split between the humans and the fae by a literal wall that really only seems decent at keeping the humans out, so of course tensions rise when Feyre accidentally kills a fae when she was simply trying to feed her family. In the fae realm, Feyre learns what really happened during the bloody conflict between their peoples, and also learns to not hate the fae, and they in turn (at least some) learn not to hate humans.

It’s taken me longer than anticipated to finish this series mainly because I didn’t really love the second book in Shades of Magic as much as I did the first. Certain main characters in the second book just really got on my nerves, and we’ll leave it at that. So “A Conjuring of Light” sat on my shelves, waiting ever so patiently, for me to stop being petty and just finish the series. The third book picks up immediately after the second book, so if you’re like me and waited a while to return you’re going to need a bit of a refresher and recap before diving in, because the story doesn’t really allow for that right off the bat. But our main characters know from the start (or close to it) just what they face, and what will happen if they don’t deal with this threat, and atone for their own mistakes. Cue redemption arcs for everyone! Sure, some characters are redeemed more than others but I always love a good redemption. I love watching characters face the consequences of previous actions, and I love having those characters grow from the experience and strengthen their own relationships in the process. So, in a nutshell: I thoroughly enjoyed this book, especially compared to “A Gathering of Shadows”.