The Fractured Sky

Well, two Realms-shattering events occurred in this book 2, one near the start, another at the end. And the end is exactly like book 1 - it ends with a cliffhanger and nothing got resolved. It's quite similar to book 1 in its pacing too - sluggish at times then it speeds up towards the end.

As for the characters, they get more fleshed out here, giving a glimpse of each of their perspectives of things. I enjoyed the fact Tauran and Aliisza are “growing”, but I found Kael to a little bland. And as with book 1, I still don't quite like the portrayal of Kaanyr, although his bullheadedness and hostility were done rather well.

The villains were more interesting, but Zasian and Kashada didn't get much limelight unfortunately. It would've been really nice to get to see more things from Zasian's point of view, but the villains sort of all went into the background towards the middle. Micus got his share of the limelight too, and it was rather well done the way Micus represented the absolute Lawful side of the alignment system.

I guess one of the reasons I found the pacing sluggish at times is because I'm basically just tagging along with Tauran and his band of misfits, who are, like the reader, not quite sure what's going on. The plot flows smoothly but their encounters felt a little weak and convenient. They seemed to lack something, like I'm not quite picking up the excitement and suspense.

So while it does clear up some of the mysteries and loose ends in book 1, it has its own share of loose ends for book 3 to clear up. I'm just not quite feeling the excitement to quickly pick up the last book in the trilogy.