Review Detail

Maria just loves killing us all with cliffhangers.

Sometimes authors slack off a bit with the world building in the second book, but not Snyder. Her world building is perfect, because there is not too much that it gets boring, but not too little so that we couldn't learn anything about Avry's world. We finally get to see some of the Northern Realms in this book, and also explore more parts of the world we already knew.

I was debating whether to give a 4 star or a 5 star for the characters, but in the end settled on 5 stars because the good stuff about the characters quite outnumbered the bad things.

I love Avry. She's strong, willing to make sacrifices, not too shallow, and she's a healer!!! :) The only problem I had with her was that she was sometimes too compulsive, she didn't stop to consider and follow other people's advice. But that wasn't too much of a problem, because Avry always manages to wiggle out of those tough situations. She wasn't the only strong female though. This book is just full of kick-ass females, even the evil ones, and even the ones who don't have magic.

Tohon, what can I say? He ranks pretty high on the "evil" list. He has powerful magic, which he uses to his own evil purpose, he's crazy, goes from friendly to murderous. The worst thing about him is he's so smart and powerful that you can imagine him winning this war.

In this one, Avry and Kerrick are separated. I think this is quite a big part of the reason why I preferred Touch of Power. The dynamic and the aggravated banter between the two of them was a very enjoyable part of the first book.

(SPOILER ALERT) And why does everyone keep coming back to life?! What, are these main characters invincible or something? Sure, some important people did die, but the really big characters just can't die. It's like, he's dead, oh no! everyone panic...... oh. hi. there you are. (END SPOILER)

I hated that cliffhanger. Now I have to wait, what, (goes to check release date of next book) another ye - *splutters* ANOTHER YEAR!?!?!?!?!? Okay, fine, it's not a full year, it comes out December this year but *splutters some more* to see what happened...

I really hope it's not the end of ... (not divulging anything here)

Please Maria, write as fast as you can.