It is absolutely mind-blowing how boring this was. The main character is a dull, chinless British guy who is embarrassed even thinking about sex, and the plot (if you can stand to call it that) is just a boring war story that happens to have a mild-mannered dragon. Yawn.

I WAS UNPREPARED.

A slow start but a very satisfying burn. I loved the magic and the complexity and the mystery and Alex's deeply flawed character.

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Bardugo is truly just so brilliant. Re-read reveals that this book, ostensibly about magic and ghosts, is truly about issues of class and humanity -- in the most disgusting and classist of ways, where the rich never hesitate to chew up the poor. It bites like The Menu, another of my favorite meditations on vanity, wealth, and being obsolete. I finished it in a day this time and loved it even more.

I gave up at 10% when the main character defended herself from sexual assault and the male main character proceeded to victimblame her and critique her outfit instead of making sure she was okay or apologizing for not protecting her.

Bardugo never disappoints. This is what a sequel should be: delving into new depths of the characters, building on the world, resolving first book issues and creating third book issues.

I hauled this hardback tome on a business trip -- so I didn't have to wait to read it -- that encompassed four flights (including one 7 hour layover) and despite its size didn't regret it for one second.

I can't give this a rating because on one hand, it's a book that was ahead of its time politically and economically and socialistically, imagining a true utopia with slogans that still ring true today, 135 years after its publication -- but on the other hand, Bellamy was a sexist sunuvabitch. I know I have to cut him some slack for being a product of 1888, but goddamn, man.

The parts I liked:

"There is no such thing in a civilized society as self-support."

"What could be more inhuman than this consequence of a partial enjoyment of education!"

"[The industrial capitalist] system of unorganized and antagonistic industries was as absurd economically as it was morally abominable."

"Mak[e] the native land truly a father-land, a father who kept the people alive and was not merely an idol for which they were expected to die."

"Why on earth should [a woman leave her job after getting married]? A husband is not a baby that he should be cared for."