This took a while to really get going, but once it did, I was all in. It had a lot of re-hashing of things that happened in the first book, and felt a bit more soap-opera-y than that one too, but hey, I still loved it. El and Orion are now seniors, and trying to come up with a plan to survive graduation. 

This book seemed to really go more in depth into the politics of the world Novik built, which I appreciated—although that came somewhat at the expense of the interactions between the leads, at least in the first half of the book. Still, by halfway through, it was a good mix of the two, and I feel like I really understand more of the main players and their motivations now. And I love them! Honestly sometimes in fantasy books I find it hard to care about the bulk of the cast, but that’s not the case with this one—pretty much every major / minor character is interesting and I like following their side plots. Pumped to finish this series, but also sad it’s almost over.