Siege and Storm (Leigh Bardugo)
The GrishaVerse
In a way, not much I can say about this book. I does feel like the second act of the serie. Like, a lot. Like Star Wars episode II. And I do not mean it in a good way.
The amplifier feels like a McGuffin. The whole books feels like a setup. A lot of the book focuses on the preparation of the Siege as hinted in the title. But the second part, the Storm, is more than rushed. All the purpose, all the preparations is just thrown away in the last pages of the book.
And since I mentioned Star Wars earlier, this is also a good time to mention that the whole magic system seems a bit weak now? Not in what it can do or not but in term of system. The (movie) description of the Force and what training meant was weak for some time but it still feels built on better fundation than what is described in the book.
There are things that are mentioned in the first book in terms of the connection with the first amplifier that I was expecting to see being explored a bit more in the second one but it wasn’t. There are since that are mentioned in half a sentence, for which the main character says it had a huge impression on them and then, nothing, not even mentionned once? I do hope these are just poorly written built ups that will be unraveled/addressed in the third volume instead of just loose ends.