I went into this having never read Tahir's An Ember in the Ashes series — which is set in the same universe and there are frequent mentions of the main characters from that series. this did make my progress a little slow at first, as there is lore introduced in the starting chapters I definitely would have better understood if I had knowledge from the previous series. still, this book stands on its own, and if you aren't like me and tend to look up things as you go along, you'd likely never know that the easter eggs from the previous series are of importance to an entire story that occurred roughly 20 years before in this universe's timeline. (although, be advised: if you have any interest in reading the Ember in the Ashes series, there will be many spoilers).

honestly, I really enjoyed this; it was probably my favorite from the reading list of my YAL course this semester (which I'm sure has nothing to do with the fact that it was the only true fantasy novel on said list and I am a speculative reader first and foremost). in hindsight, this was an interesting pick by my professor for this course, as it distinctly feels more "new adult" fantasy to me than YA fantasy.

there were some aspects I enjoyed more than others (the romance didn't sell me completely, for instance, but it wasn't cloying) but I do love Tahir's writing and I think I will definitely be in the market for the second part of this duology once its out. the worldbuilding is truly fascinating, so if I find the time, I will also look into reading back into the Ember series.

one thing I'd like to note, though: this is a 4 star story for me, but the audiobook specifically I would probably rate more around a 2.5. this comes at a disappointment, because the audiobook for Tahir's All My Rage was beautiful and really amplified the novel's emotional impact for me. but this? was a step down, and if anything it nerfed my enjoyment and connection with the text. nothing against the narrating cast specifically — I believe it's definitely more an issue with the direction. there were pronunciation discrepancies I found extremely distracting; I get regional accents of the characters would play into that, but there were alternating pronunciations by the same character within the same chapter. it was especially strange with names. and there was a lot of confusion when the narrator's would seem to mix up who was speaking, and inflect/do a voice established for a certain character when that character was not the one speaking. generally just pretty chaotic and disorganized, which does a disservice to a story this good.