Absolutely improves upon the first book in every single way. Multiple badass women juxtapose the previous novel where there wasn’t any standout one; multiple new places/lands are revealed; a new, interesting culture; time is a lot more malleable and really effective at breaking up various physical conflicts.

It’s actually sweeping, the technology and the magic is different and cool. The prose work is the same as previous. It doesn’t blow me away but neither does it feel like bog standard commercial fiction. It is 880 pages and so quite the commitment. It is worth it, I think. But also: the next book is 1000+? As much as I liked this and the marked improvement was great to see, the next two books are around 1000 pages. And they’re part of an ongoigg be series. I think I’m much more tempted to pick up a serious maximalist book than long genre fiction. But we’ll see.

4.5 rounded up.