I absolutely devoured this book, so much faster than I anticipated. I actually started it and then had to stop to read other books from the library, and I started to resent those books because they were keeping me from reading this one. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I was so drawn to this book, but I was a decent chunk of the way in when I realized the parallels between it and Beauty and the Beast (which is far and away my favorite fairytale). I was so here for it. In this case though, I suppose it’s Beauty and the Beasts, and that’s another thing that keeps me coming back for Pennza’s books: she has mastered the art of the MMF romance. 

I enjoyed how she characterized Mirella, Andrin and Rane. I only wish that we had gotten a bit more development of their romance earlier in the book. It wasn’t until about 3/4 of the way in before Mirella really started being a part of that romantic group and I wish we had a bit more build up in the earlier part of the book. Otherwise, I liked the romance in this book more than I did with the Frostbound Queen. 

As far as other characters, I love Ginhad so freaking much. He is the best character, and I will be accepting no arguments. He is such well written comedic relief in this book. It was actually his character that made it click for me that this book was giving such strong Beauty and the Beast vibes, because I went, “Oh, this is Lumiere!” Well, Lumiere if the sassiness and horniness was dialed waaaaaay up, but, again, that’s what I’m here for. 

I also appreciate that while this is the second book in the series, it isn’t really necessary to have read the first book. There are some references to it in this book and it certainly goes into some aspects of the overall magic system a bit more, but it was nice that Pennza has each one of the Elvin Courts have their own subset of magic that you can understand independently within each novel. 

I do think the ending itself felt a bit rushed, and between that and the romance not feeling like it quite had enough time to develop, it almost felt like this would have been better done in two books. But I get that this being an installment in this broader series that involves the other courts limits that a bit. I guess it can be taken as a positive, though, that I would have gladly read another book about these characters and their story. 

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.