This book is currently a 3-star for me, but I think I need to give it another chance when the third and final book in the series comes out next year. Normally, I would've re-read the first book before going into this one. I read over 150 books a year, so it often happens that specific plot points may not be at the forefront of my mind when picking up subsequent books in a series when I read the previous entry a year or more before. Unfortunately, I decided not to do that with Kingsbane, and I think the book suffered in my estimation because of it.

I still enjoy the writing, and the world is still very interesting. But there were moments when a character would show up from the first book and I couldn't remember who they were.

I also think this book doesn't need to be as long as it is. There are a lot of repetitive scenes and internal dialogue that could've been trimmed.

I would also like to point out to anyone interested in this book that this is marketed as YA, but there are some very graphic sex scenes in this book that veer closer to Adult than YA. For anyone sensitive to that sort of content, I would take note.

I didn't see the ending coming. I don't want to say exactly what I'm referring to, but there is a character reveal that shook me. I had to go back and listen again because I was sure that I'd misheard. I'll be interested to see where the story goes from this point.

I will read the third book when it comes out, and this time I will absolutely re-read the previous two books, because I think this series is good overall.