ok okay this one is much better than the first one. 

Celaena is still the most annoying character. She's frequently stupid, always selfish and thoughtless and does whatever she wants without thinking about the consequences or whether it's the greatest idea (spoiler alert, it's usually not). 

Chaol is fine, Dorian is fine, they grow on me, they were less boring than in the first book. I really don't love a triangle but I'll cope with it here.

The plot is more interesting. The last book was so boring, this has more going for it in terms of page turning - I got to a point and I wanted to keep going. 

But, and it's something I said about the first CC, the last few chapters are like an end at the end of every chapter, I was turning the pages and rolling my eyes at yet another chapter. There are only so many dramatic endings you can write before they become silly.

The big reveal at the end... kind of spoiled for me - it's hard to go into this series without spoilers and I had already guessed this ending though it wasn't exactly subtly spelled out. And I find that it feels like a clumsy reveal. If she knows, we should know, we're too much in her thoughts for this to be kept from the reader for two whole books and it felt dishonest.