Dance of Stars and Ashes

Yet another fantastic addition to this series! I can't believe I breezed through it so quickly; now the agony of waiting for the next two books begins!

As I mentioned in my review of the first book, Heart of Night and Fire, I'm absolutely enamored with the series' setting and craving more fantasy books in a similar backdrop. If anyone has recommendations, please do share!

Zarya, Yasen, Aarav, and Rabin underwent significant character development in this installment. For me, I think Aarav grew on me the most. With that being said, Aarav's final scene was heart-wrenching, and he truly deserved a hero's send-off.

The anticipation is killing me as I wonder about Zarya's future encounters, the unraveling of her history, and how it will shape her. And that big reveal involving Rabin – seriously, he has some explaining to do!

Nisha has once again worked her magic, and I'm thrilled that I picked up this series. Exploring her other works is definitely on my to-do list!

Tuli is such a captivating writer and I can feel her passion and creativity in every single page. I love that I'm rarely bored in her books and that I have to force myself to stop reading because I don't want to.

I already really liked Zarya from the first book and I definitely love her now. She's fiery and passionate she is. She stands up for herself, for others. She's a strong character and actually shows it, not just says it. I can't wait to see where Tuli takes her in the following books (hopefully to get more books!).

The plot thickens in this sequel with twists and it was done well, as I knew it would be. The pacing was slower but that's good! Plus it's a 4 book series so there'll be a long arc with several smaller ones set over the series.

The slow burn love interest in this definitely heats up extremely and I wanted more! Zabin was a great character – I mean, sure, he did annoy me from time to time. But what's a romantasy love interest without being annoyed at them? I loved the slow burn aspect. I can't wait to get to the next book and see where the characters go and how they continue to feel about each other.

I can't talk about the plot too much because, obviously, spoilers are heavily abound but I thought it was good. It picks up right after the first book and I can tell a lot isn't revealed yet – because we have 2 more books to go through. And honestly, I can't wait for that! Tuli writes such rich plots and entangles side and main plots together well enough you don't realise it.

I always like it when we have a protagonist who's new to all of what's going on because we get to learn through them. Plus when it's magic, most of them are magic-learned, so we get to know the magic system through them. I didn't fully understand the one in here but I hope the next ones shed more light on it.

She knows how to write plot twists. Other writers should follow her (not naming names but crown and island curse book