I have to admit, I was a little disappointed after reading 'Under the Never Sky'. It wasn't that I didn't like the book, because I did. It was just that I had heard amazing things about this trilogy and bought the whole set before beginning to read, because I was sure I was going to binge these books in a day. However, after I finished 'Under the Never Sky', I didn't feeling a pressing urge to pick this book up. I still liked the first book and knew I wanted to read the whole series in a shortish time span, but I wasn't as obsessed as I'd hoped to be.

I wish I could go back to a few days ago and tell myself to just jump right in, because 'Through the Ever Night' was wonderful. I was hooked from the very first page, and it didn't let me go. I read this book in about three and a half hours, and that was with me taking a break to make and eat breakfast. It is such an enjoyable read.

Things I liked-

The Friendships: I love that friendship plays such an important role in this book. Perry and Roar's friendship is really great, but I think I actually prefer his relationship with Aria. They bond over the fact that they are both Auds. They have such amazing chemistry, and it is not romantic at all, which I really appreciate. It would've been so easy for Rossi to turn that into a love triangle, but she respects her readers, her characters, and their love story enough not to go there.

The Romance: Aria and Perry make a great team, and their romance is written very well. I was nervous for a minute near the end of the book because I thought Rossi was going to introduce a different love interest for one of the characters, but thankfully that didn't last long. I also loved Roar and Liv, and wanted more of the two of them.

The Side Characters: One thing I feel that this book did much better than the first was introduce side characters. In the first book, we are told the names of many of Aria's friends from home, but aside from Paisley, who is only in the book for a couple of chapters, we don't really learn any kind of backstory for those characters. Now, I still feel that this book could've delved a little deeper into some of Aria's past relationships with the people still back at the Reverie, but there was a little bit more information in this book. I'm hoping that the third book will explore those characters more fully. But what this book DOES do is introduce a whole cast of side characters who live in the Tides. Many of these characters were not mentioned in book one, so the fact that they all feel wholly unique and yet fit in to the story so seamlessly was very satisfying for me. I also, surprisingly, liked the reemergence of Soren in this book. I will be interested to see what his story arc is in the third book.

The World-building: This is still a little bit of a shaky area for me, but I feel like it was much improved over book one. We finally got an explanation as to what caused the aether. Unless I totally missed it (which is possible, since I had a hard time concentrating during the early parts of book one), I don't remember the cause of the aether sky ever being explained. There were a few other cases of this happening as well. It wasn't info-dumpy at all, but just solidified parts of the world in my head.

Things I didn't like:

This is tough. I honestly found myself extremely satisfied with this book. If I'd read these as they were coming out, I'd probably say the end because I need the third book NOW...but I have the third book sitting right next to me...

There is one moment in the book that pretty much devastated me. I had to go back and re-read it to make sure I'd read it properly because I wasn't expecting it. I definitely didn't 'like' that, but it's not like it was a weakness in the book. I actually think it made the book more believable. It raised the stakes.

I am so excited to jump right into 'Into the Still Blue'. I hope that the conclusion will be as satisfying as this second installment was.