A Darker Shade of Magic

I super enjoyed this ride through the 3 (out of 4) Londons and their take on magic. Kell, Lila and Rhy were also interesting characters - I hope the latter makes more appearances in the next few books :) As I was nearing the end, I was afraid it was going to end on a cliffhanger somewhere as that would've been veryyy easy for Scwab to do, but was appreciative that she gave us a proper ending haha.

Lila was a breath of fresh air after seeing example after example of the competent-til-it-counts female protag. She actually held her own and I loved reading her exchanges with folks (especially with Rhy). There were points where I literally laughed aloud at their banter. There was a moment in the story which I wish almost every character with a nonsensical decision making process could be asked, where Kell outright demanded Lila: “What is wrong with you?” and prompted for her logic, which gave her an opportunity to be understood more by both Kell and the reader. By the end, I would've liked to have Lila repay at least one of her debts (since her Grey London friend had passed), and revisited the clothing merchant before taking off on a ship. It seemed like that would've been a nice bookend to her adventure there, but maybe that's going to happen in a future book.

Romance wasn't shoved down our throats, and Lila didn't let her connection with Kell tether her to the city, because that wouldn't have matched her hopes and dreams. Going back to the whole tropes thing: omg, it's a female character leaving a male character for once, for the sake of adventure - how refreshing! lol.

Schwab's writing is a treat to read, and I'm looking forward to devouring her other works!