First off, I'd like to mention I'm writing the review after reading Siege and Storm and half of Ruin and Rising (I love it so far). Why? Laziness. I like this book. It achieves what it sets out to do competently. The characters are reasonably likable and interesting. Mal, the main love interest, is great in this book.My favorite part of the book is what the book does with the Darkling. The kiss took me aback and I didn't like it at all. I thought he was extremely creepy being sexual and all with a seventeen-year-old while he's hundreds of years old. This turns out to be intentional and the Darkling really is a big, manipulative, creepy asshole. Love that.
A great continuation of Six of Crows. The characters were still amazing, I enjoyed the prose - this time, the plot also had a bigger focus. I loved the book - but I have two and a half problems with it that prevent me from 5/5. Major spoilers ahead. The final part of the book, "Action and Echo", felt very rushed to me. I knew Matthias was going to die and it still felt sudden, and not in a good way, but in an extremely abrupt way. We were shown the emotional consequences of this on the crows, but I still felt the book moved on too quickly, and set the death up even quicker. Nina completely disappears a bit after Matthias's. The second problem is the resolution to Wylan's plotline - I actually loved how it ended up, but I hate we were only told he got back his mother and she is starting to become herself again but it's going to be a long process. Why couldn't we have had another POV chapter of Wlan's? Can you imagine how powerful that would be? Marya Henriks overall feels like a plot device, not a character, which is a pity - alas, instead of expanding on her character and writing a beautiful emotional reunion we had a chapter of Wylan taking the Van Eck mansion. The last problem is much smaller - Inej. While I love Kanej was resolved and wouldn't have it any other way, we should have seen Inej talk to her parents. The whole book builds up to I nej telling her parents what she's done - if she could justify it somehow, if what she did right. The second conflict was resolved in her fight with Dunyasha, the second? Never, apparently. Even so, I love the book.
I love this book. Truly got me back into reading, though the Prašina trilogy certainly helped. The crows are interesting, charming, and funny. I loved the prose - it was descriptive just enough that it never got in the way of the plot but gave me a great idea of how things looked. The backstories of the characters were captivating, the whole beautifully emotional. However, it ends on a cliffhanger and thus without reading the sequel you'll have no closure and a certain part made me uncomfortable. However the atmosphere, dialogue, action... it was amazing.