If you're looking for a story that has a sarcastic and grounded main character with a plot that involves lots of crime solving and supernatural elements, this is the book for you. There are way too many books in this series, so I probably will just read a few more of the books if I decide to continue at all. The plot was interesting and there was always a lot going on that focused more on the mystery and crime aspects of the story. Urban fantasy tends to have a bad rep for bad storytelling, so I'm glad at least this book is an exception. Some of the character motives aren't completely clear and keep you wondering until the very end. The characters are three dimensional for the most part and complex. The vampires and some other supernatural brings were sometimes off putting in their practices, but vampires have always been associated with eroticism, so that's not surprising. There isn't actually any sex in the book that is explicitly described or anything, which I'm happy for, because there is too much of that in urban fantasy sometimes. Overall, it's an interesting book and I'll probably read the next one at some point.

This novella was an okay read. I'm not mad at it, but it wasn't amazing by any means. The author seemed to not be able to give distinct enough features to the three main characters for me to tell them apart as I listened to the audio book. It felt in the end like the story did a lot of telling rather than showing. This is especially prevalent at the end when the author seems to rush to wrap everything up and just tells us what the fate of each character is. There didn't seem to be an ultimate goal for Liza, Emily, and Celeste. They spoke often about freedom and their love of the island, but never really did anything about it, which made the story progression seem stagnant. This wasn't the worst thing I ever read, but I'd hesitate to pick something else up from this author.

I would like to take this time to thank Marissa Meyer for successfully incorporating characters from the first book in this series into the sequel. Also, thank you for knowing how to write characters with realistic reactions to knowing each other for short periods of time. The amount of times I've gotten a male love interest in a YA novel that is controlling and domineering in an abusive way because it's in "his nature" is something I've lost count of. Wolf is probably one of my favorite characters so far because he understands boundaries and respects the free will of those around him. That's so hard to find in male characters sometimes. Scarlet is also a great addition to the cast of characters with her assertive nature. Her badassery is much appreciated. Thorne is also reasonably charming in his own way and I can't wait to see his role in book 3. Meyer knows how to add a creative twist to these fairytales and also make three dimensional characters that act like normal people in the situations they are placed in. I don't expect any group of strangers to be willing to trust each other completely or sacrifice everything for each other, and the characters in this book don't. They are working together because of their circumstances and all of them have their own individual motives. Each character has their fleshed out backstory and is written with purpose. Something I can't fail to mention is that Ran is an asshat and is gross and disgusting to me on various uncomfortable levels. Just a heads up. Definitely going to continue this series and hopefully reviewing these books. I highly recommend this series!

Wondeful Jason/Batman moment in this issue. Probably one of my favorites so far.

This entire book reads like a really long introduction, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. This book is after all, an introduction to a series. Alanna is written pretty realistically for a girl her age. She starts off her training towards knighthood being quite whiny and expresses her emotions in quite a volatile manner even thinking for quitting. Thankfully her mentor, Coram, convinces her otherwise. Seeing Alanna befriend people around her and deal with the changes that women go through during puberty was great. It's unusual for themes like puberty to be explored in young adult books like this. Alanna having trouble coping with the fact that she is a woman despite the social constraints that entails is also interesting. I really do appreciate the exploration of these themes by the books and hope to continue reading the rest of the books in time.

This book actually didn't go anywhere I thought it would go, and not in a good way. Based on the title and all the hype around it, I thought the story would be super compelling. I thought that maybe she was stealing Torah's and giving them to Jews before these books were burned or something. That would have been a much more interesting story. I don't even truly understand the title of this book. Liesel, the main character, only steals about three books in the course of the story. She doesn't really have things in particular that she likes to do and lacks a personality overall. We are told that she likes to read and she is taught how to read by her foster father, but that's about as much of a personality trait as she's given. My favorite part of the book was probably Liesel's best friend, Rudy. He's very excitable and ends up developing feelings for Liesel. He's flirty and playful with her and has a very distinct personality that is entertaining and humorous. I think what annoyed me the most is that we are told who will die and often the type of death certain characters will have at the very beginning of the book. Then, when we actually get to parts of the book that are supposed to be shocking and emotional, they lose their shock value because the revelation was given at the beginning of the book. It really is anti climactic and the ending was unrealistic and unemotional because of it. I didn't feel upset or sad, just ticked off because the story wants to try and get the reader to feel for characters that aren't really worth feeling for or wants the reader to be surprised about things that they were told at the beginning of the book. The narration was interesting since the story is narrated by death. However, due to all the unnecessary spoilers and German vocabulary that is immediately afterwards defined in English (defeating the purpose), it got repetitive very quickly. I don't think this is a horrible book, by any means, but it was so ordinary that I fail to understand how it won awards and such. I've read much better books, honestly. I own a paperback copy, but this book is definitely going off of my "worth owning" list. I'd say it's maybe worth borrowing, and even that is doubtful.

I really do appreciate how Alanna has grown as a character in this book. This installment in the series explores how Alanna's relationship with love becomes more complex and how she decides what she truly wants her future to look like. There is a love triangle of sorts in this book, which I'm not exactly a fan of. This isn't because of the way it was executed in the book necessarily, but simply because I personally have an aversion to love triangles. This one isn't too bad, though, and Alanna's decision in the end makes total sense in terms of her character and what she wants out of life. Alanna learns to be a leader and work with others as well as further prove herself as a great asset in battle and as a friend. I am starting to be very concerned about her brother Thomas, though, and what he is up to with his magic. I'm sure this will be further explored in the next book which I'm excited about. This so far is my favorite book in the series and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to get into fantasy novels.

This book seemed more interesting than the first and I think it has a lot to do with Alanna becoming more comfortable in her own skin. The first book involved Alanna very openly rejecting her femininity, which in a world setting like this, makes sense.The fact that she is woman limits her socially in terms of what she can do in huge ways, which is why her fear of her identity being revealed is understandable. She starts to explore more female endeavors such as wearing dresses, which is a side of her that is nice to see. Overall, I was happy to see her become comfortable enough to accept herself as a girl in this book and be more self aware of her feelings.



**MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD**



John and George both start to develop feelings for Alanna, so I'm sure this will be explored further in book 3. I have a feeling that John and her might not work as a couple down the line. Alanna enjoys her social freedom and the life of a prince doesn't necessarily allow for that, so we'll see where that goes. I've honestly always liked George better, but maybe that's just because I have a soft spot for the underdog/good hearted thieves.