4 stars
OVERALL: Our main characters are in a sorry state and pretty much stay bleak and damaged throughout this book, as their situations grow more and more bleak. But this is the start of a rallying cry that I think will ring out in book 3.
Content warnings: violence, death, pain, depression, attempted rape, prisoners, snakes, PTSD, war

This second book, as we follow devastated main characters who are heartbroken and full of regret, pain, and shame, is definitely much more bleak compared to book 1. The characters of Zuzana and Mik really are the only points of light and happiness to bring the book up, though I suppose Ziri is also a bit of a levity too.
Ziri's character is super interesting to me--he brings some optimism and heroism to the table and we can see how inherently GOOD he is; yet he is also a tragic character: the last of his kind, in love with Karou despite the improbability of that ever happening, and then his terrible choice and position at the end of the book. But I love him and his storyline!

There were also other points of view in this book, covering all the characters mentioned above but also people farther afield: an angel soldier on guard duty, a child chimera civilian on the run--these helped bring more detail into the story and fleshed out the world, and I think were a break from our wrecked main characters. But these points of view really didn't bring any change of tone to the story, if anything showing how crappy things were going away from the crummy situations of Karou and Akiva.
Maybe this book suffers from middle book syndrome? It was slower than book one and was doing a lot of set-up for the third book.




(2017)
This sequel didn't have as much oomph or drive as the first, but I still really enjoyed it!
I actually read it so quickly that I hardly remember what happened, so will want to re-read it again in a few months just to find out what actually happened to the characters (this is what happened with Mockingjay as well!)