Oh, friends. This one was a little disappointing for me. To be clear, I added a star to my rating by the time I finished this book, and I didn't hate it, but there was so much about it that I just didn't enjoy.

First, the good: The twist about who the spy was really did surprise me, as did some of the motivation behind it. This was the section of the book that most drew me in (the last third or so). I did enjoy the cast of characters, though I was always left wanting to know more about them and they felt really one dimensional to me.

So, the bad. Why I didn't like it nearly as much as I expected: I think based on the premise I was expecting enemies to lovers, but it was very much not that in my opinion. Instant attraction, maybe, which I don’t mind. But “The Villain” was such a caricature, I didn’t even really buy him as Evie’s “enemy”. He’s evil, but why? We don't learn this until the end of the book, which ended up being satisfying, but for the majority of the book I kept asking "why should I care about any of this?" 

I just kept waiting for this to get better. At first it was just some little annoyances - Evie tries *so* hard to be witty, it just drove me insane. Very much giving “I’m not like every other girl” vibes. Some of the jokes she made or the way she always had a comeback for everything made me want to rip my hair out - I liked her better at the end of the book when she sort of embraces the fact that she has a little bit of dark in her as well.

I also kept waiting for more magic to show up. It’s mentioned briefly a few times and then in chapters 9 and 10, The Villain uses his magic, but how it works and what it does is just… never explained? They talk about people's magic developing, but not really what type of magic they have, how it manifests, what it *looks* like... anything to make it a little more real.

At the risk of sounding picky, I also just have to say that I knew this one wasn’t for me when

Evie is trying to run away from a bomb that is about to go off, but her heel gets stuck in a cobblestone. She yanks at the stone!!! Until she’s bleeding!!!! GIRL, TAKE OFF YOUR SHOE!

Sorry to say I won’t be continuing this series, I don’t think. If anyone wants to change my mind or if the series gets better, I’d love to hear about it.