So, surprisingly, I loved this... No one is more surprised by this rating than I am.
Ever since I've read A Darker Shade of Magic for the first time in 2016, I thought this series was incredibly overhyped and not as good as everyone said it was. To finally read this sequel that has been sitting on my shelves unread for years, I re-read the first book, and while it was better than the first time I've read it, my problems with it still remained. And so, my expectations for this book weren't very high, I was expecting a 4-star, 3-star rating.
But A Gathering of Shadows had everything I thought was missing in the first book. I love character-based stories and this book was exactly that, the "real" plot of the book started in the 300-page mark. And I started to like and care about all of the characters, while Rhy is still my favorite, I loved Alucard, Kell, and Lila.
The only real big problem I had with the book was its predictability, I guessed correctly what was going to happen in the end, and why it was such a cliff-hanger about halfway through. However, I still really enjoyed it, and now I can't wait to read ACOL.