I read this book immediately after finishing tEoTW and was seriously disappointed. I didn’t have any issues with the writing itself, but the story, the plotting, and the characters almost made me quit the series.
Character Regression
The characters were all very annoying in Book One, but began to progress at the end of the first book. So, I was looking forward to seeing more of that progression in this book, only to find that they reverted back to their earlier versions. The Dark One’s forces are still hunting our Fellowship of Emond’s Field and manage to steal a relic that must be tracked by our young heroes. Throughout this new quest our heroes continue making incredibly stupid decisions without any consequences, and at one point they even hate each other — then go back to loving each other in the course of one exchange. Sure, family and friends can fall out and reconcile all the time, but there was no build up to this weird payoff. It was just awkward.
The Ending
The strongest part of this book was the ending. The middle of this book was full of repetition and endless walking with cringeworthy moments of dialogue dispersed throughout. We learn more about the world and the mythology surrounding our young hero, but this really should have been condensed into one book with Book One. I rated this installment 3 stars, which would have been lower if not for the very engaging ending.
With that being said, I would still recommend reading this series up to this point as I’m still curious to know more about this story. However, if I re-read this story I’d probably skim through most of the middle portions of the first two books and focus on the endings.