For such a hefty novel at 705 pages, I expected a much more dramatic climax to ALL of the information that was disseminated throughout it. Instead, it just felt like a series of character surprising character reveals and a lot of set-up for the next installment. (Which is okay, I was mostly entertained by the unexpected character introductions and I have some faith that the last novel will tie things together very well.) I’m not sure why the pacing felt much slower compared to the Alchemist’s Daughter - by comparison,  the characters travel to a  wider variety of places, and there are definitely a few action-packed sequences that keep things interesting,  but then I suppose so much of their “investigating” really amounts to such little information that the overall story feels bogged down by breadcrumbs of info. By far, the winning feature of the story remains the rich cast of female characters; they’re altogeheer charming and it’s nice to see new character bonds forming between unexpected pairs ( I’m thinking particularly of Beatrice and Catherine, and Mary and Justine.) I’m really hoping the next book doesn’t disappoint on delivering a satisfying conclusion